Conditions we support › Heart Health

How it works

We build meals around plants and fish, use olive oil and nuts as the main fats, and choose whole carbs over refined ones. Sodium and added sugar stay moderate, and lean proteins round things out.

Who it's a good fit for

Anyone eating for their cardiovascular health, or with risk factors like family history, high blood pressure, or high cholesterol. (It's the same pattern as our Mediterranean plan.)

What the research shows

Heart health is the area where nutrition science has the most, and the best, evidence, and it keeps pointing to the same place: a Mediterranean-style way of eating. The headline study, called PREDIMED, took thousands of people at high cardiovascular risk and put them on a Mediterranean diet built around olive oil, nuts, fish, vegetables, and whole grains. Over about five years, the people eating that way had roughly 30 percent fewer heart attacks, strokes, and cardiovascular deaths than the comparison group. That's a drug-sized effect from food, and it's why this pattern is the backbone of the plan.

The deeper lesson is a freeing one: your heart responds to the overall shape of your eating, not to any single hero food or villain. What moves the needle is the pattern, with plants, fish, and olive oil crowding out processed meat, refined carbs, and ultra-processed food. Even the fat story is about swaps rather than fear. Trading saturated fat for the unsaturated kind in olive oil, nuts, and fish helps your heart, while trading it for white bread and sugar doesn't. So this isn't a plan of anxious avoidance. It's a plan of good defaults, repeated often.

What to keep in mind

Food is one of several pillars, and it works best when the others are handled too. Your blood pressure, your cholesterol, your blood sugar, whether you smoke, how you move, and your family history all feed into heart risk, so eating well is powerful but not a substitute for the rest of your care. If you already have heart disease or take medication, keep your provider in the loop, and a couple of specifics matter: sodium targets should be set for you personally rather than guessed at, and if you're on a blood thinner like warfarin, you don't need to avoid leafy greens, but you do want to keep your intake of them steady from week to week, since big swings can throw off your dose. The food works with your treatment, not instead of it.

Common questions