New Heart and Nutrition Study

You may have already heard about Dr. Esselstyn's previous study as discribed in his book, Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease. In that study, the 17 people who switched to a plant based diet had no further coronary events in the 12 years that followed their diet change, as compared with 49 coronary events in the 8 years before.

Dr. Esselstyn has done it again, this time with a much larger study. In this case, he tracked 198 patients, 177 (89%) of whom adhered to a no-oil plant based diet, with only one case (0.6%) having a further coronary event. In contrast, the 21 patients (11%) that were not compliant with the diet had 13 coronary events for a rate of 62%. These patients continued to get standard cardiac care from their physicians. The group who had a healthy diet thus had a coronary event rate less than 1/100th that of the group getting standard care (0.6% vs 62%).

This study shows once again that there is no other diet, medication, or surgical procedure that can come close to what a no-oil plant -based diet can do for you. To be blunt, if you suffer or die from heart disease (and it is the leading killer) you are doing it to yourself through your choice of what you eat. The good news: eat a no-oil plant-based diet and you will not develop heart disease, and if you already have it, it will not progress and will likely reverse.

The publication of this study occurred while I was working on a newsletter to you comparing the outcomes of different approaches to treating heart disease. I will incorporate the results of Dr. Esselstyn's latest study into my newsletter, which you should see in a week or two.

Until then, choose life and choose health by choosing to eat a no-oil whole-food plant based diet.

If you would like to read the study, as published in the Journal of Family Practice, you can find it here. And you can learn more about Dr. Esselstyn's book here.

John Tanner, PhD
Director, NuSci, The Nutrition Science Foundation