Heart-Healthy Eating: Focus on the Overall Dietary Pattern

A healthy, balanced dietary pattern—not an emphasis on individual nutrients or foods—is central to preventing and managing cardiovascular and cardiometabolic disease, according to a new American College of Cardiology Scientific Statement. The statement reviews evidence on macronutrients, micronutrients, dietary patterns, ultra-processed foods, and emerging nutrition-based interventions, emphasizing that heart-healthy eating should prioritize minimally processed plant-based foods, healthy fats and proteins while limiting refined starches, added sugars, sodium, unhealthy fats, and highly processed foods of poor nutritional quality. Water and other unsweetened beverages should be preferred over sugar-sweetened drinks, and alcohol should generally be limited or avoided. The statement also highlights nutrition’s important role across cardiovascular-kidney-metabolic health, including cardiovascular disease, diabetes, obesity, and chronic kidney disease, and stresses that food security—including the availability, affordability, accessibility, and utilization of nutritious foods—must be considered when addressing diet quality. GLP-1 receptor agonists can provide substantial weight loss and cardiovascular benefits, but maintaining a nutrient-rich, high-quality diet remains important during treatment. Overall, the statement emphasizes that heart-healthy eating is not about following a single diet trend or avoiding one particular food or nutrient, but about sustaining an overall high-quality dietary pattern that supports cardiometabolic health over time. Source: https://www.acc.org/