AUSTRALIA: Wholegrains Help Reduce Heart Attack, Say Researchers

SPIT JUNCTION, NSW, Australia (GoGrain), November 28, 2007: If you are a man and consume plenty of wholegrain cereals for breakfast you probably have a lower risk of heart failure, compared to a man who never or rarely eats wholegrains for breakfast. The authors of an article in the October edition of Archives of Internal Medicine explain that the lifetime risk for heart failure is about 20 per cent for both men and women at 40 years of age. Previous studies already indicate that high wholegrain consumption is linked to a lower risk of hypertension (high blood pressure), coronary heart disease and high blood cholesterol (hypercholesterolemia) - and lower mortality in general. This new study from Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School in Boston, looked at the link between breakfast cereal consumption and new cases of heart failure among 21,376 males whose average age was 53.7 years. All the males had been taking part in the Physicians Health Study I. They estimated cereal consumption by using a food frequency questionnaire and incident heart failure was calculated by annual follow-up questionnaires for 19.6 years (average). Of the participants, 1,018 experienced heart failure during the follow-up period. Included were 362 of 6,995 males who did not eat any cereal, 237 of 4,987 who consumed one serving per week of cereal or less, 230 of 5,227 who consumed two to six cereal servings per week, and 189 of 4,167 who consumed at least seven cereal servings per week. The writers concluded that their data “demonstrate that a higher intake of wholegrain breakfast cereals is associated with a lower risk of heart failure." They believe this link is due to the beneficial effects of wholegrains on heart failure risk factors such as heart attack, diabetes, high blood pressure and obesity. "If confirmed in other studies, a higher intake of wholegrains along with other preventive measures could help lower the risk of heart failure," they concluded. Source: Arch intern Med, 2007 Copyright © 2006 Go Grains Health and Nutrition Pty Limited