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Eating a diet rich in fruits and vegetables and low in saturated fats can significantly lower the risk of heart attack for people with mildly elevated blood pressure, Johns Hopkins University researchers say.

The diet they examined — called the DASH diet (dietary approaches to stop hypertension) — was designed to lower blood pressure and cholesterol. In this new study, it reduced the risk of heart attack by almost 20%, the researchers said.

The diet also calls for reducing fats, red meat, sweets and sugary beverages, and replacing them with whole grains, poultry, low-fat dairy products, fish and nuts.

A new study adds yet another reason to consider scaling back your soda intake, and it's already putting beverage makers on the defensive. Researchers from the School of Public Health at Imperial College in London analyzed the diets of nearly 2,700 middle-aged people in the U.S. and the U.K. They found that people drinking more than one soda or other sugar-sweetened beverage a day had higher blood pressure, and that it kept going up the more they drank. After accounting for weight and other risk factors, that habit seemed to still put them at greater risk for cardiovascular problems.

The researchers also found that people who drank more than one sugary drink a day consumed nearly 400 more calories than those who didn't. And their diets were more likely to lack key nutrients like potassium, magnesium and calcium. "This is because they're getting the calories from these nutrient-poor sources. All they provide is the calories — none of the benefits of real foods," Brown says.

The new study seems to bolster previous research showing that cutting back even just a serving of soda a day can help lower blood pressure for those most at risk.

People with metabolic syndrome -- a cluster of risk factors for heart disease, stroke and type 2 diabetes -- have a better chance of reversing it if they stick to a healthy diet, a new study shows.

A person is considered to have metabolic syndrome if they have three or more of the following risk factors: excess belly fat; high triglyceride levels (a harmful blood fat); low levels of "good" HDL cholesterol; high blood pressure; and either high blood sugar levels or type 2 diabetes.

According to the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute (NHLBI), having metabolic syndrome doubles a person's risk of heart disease and quintuples their risk of developing type 2 diabetes. Nearly a quarter of US adults have the metabolic syndrome.

A new study published on Thursday in the journal Health Affairs calculates that it would cost the average American an extra $380 in fruits and vegetables per year to meet the government's recommendation for potassium intake alone. Healthy foods are expensive. Conversely, the unhealthier your diet gets, the less it costs. The study found that for each 1% increase in calories from saturated fat, food costs decline by 28¢; for each 1% increase in calories from added sugar, the savings equal 7¢.

Not only are fresh, whole foods costly, but there isn't enough of them to go around. Regarding the U.S. food supply, the researchers wrote: The current system has proved to be remarkably effective in the provision of calories, but not as good at supplying nutrients. More fundamentally, the system currently falls short of producing enough vegetables and fruit to supply Americans with even the minimum recommended number of daily servings of these foods.

Potassium was, calorie for calorie, the most expensive nutrient. U.S. guidelines recommend that Americans get 4,700 mg of potassium each day, but study participants got just 2,800 mg per day on average. In order to make up the difference, a person would have to spend an additional $1.04 per day

More Americans say they are aware of the health benefits of functional foods, but there has been no increase over the past five years in the number of people who are eating them on a regular basis, according to a new survey from the International Food Information Council (IFIC). Functional foods are foods that may provide health benefits beyond basic nutrition. Examples include fish such as salmon, which are rich in heart-protective omega-3 fatty acids, and whole grains, which help maintain digestive health while potentially lowering the risk of colorectal cancer. Berries, dark green leafy vegetables like spinach and kale, and other colorful fruits and vegetables also are considered functional foods.

Ninety-five percent of the respondents believe that they have control over their own health. Nearly half said that heart disease was their most important health concern, followed by weight and cancer. And three-quarters of those who took the survey said that food plays the most important role in both maintaining and improving one’s overall health. “Nine out of 10 people can name at least one food and its associated health benefits,” Elizabeth Rahavi, RD, associate director of health and wellness at the IFIC, told reporters. That’s up from just under eight out of 10 in 1998. “That’s a really exciting trend.”

For example, 85% of the people surveyed recognized that omega-3 fatty acids offer cardiovascular benefits. But of those who are aware of those benefits, less than half report that they get omega-3s. There were similar findings for food components associated with overall health and well-being. While most of the respondents knew the value of protein and B vitamins, the survey reveals, only about half of those people make them a regular fixture at mealtimes.

We should move toward food-based instead of nutrient-based dietary guidelines.

we should be promoting whole foods, not specific nutrients which push consumers toward processed products

While nutritional science at the nutrient and molecular level is fascinating and making incredible progress, I think the most effective way to reverse health epidemics is to focus on education about foods and changing the nutritional environment.

Exercises that look like pilates or yoga routines are in. And the traditional bane of the new private, the long run, has been downgraded. This is the Army’s new physical-training program, which has been rolled out this year at its five basic training posts that handle 145,000 recruits a year. Nearly a decade in the making, its official goal is to reduce injuries and better prepare soldiers for the rigors of combat in rough terrain like Afghanistan.

“What we were finding was that the soldiers we’re getting in today’s Army are not in as good shape as they used to be,” said Lt. Gen. Mark Hertling, who oversees basic training for the Army. “This is not just an Army issue. This is a national issue.”

“Between 1995 and 2008, the proportion of potential recruits who failed their physicals each year because they were overweight rose nearly 70 percent,”

Between 1988-94 and 2005-06, the percentage of teens with hearing loss jumped by about a third, from 15% of 12-to-19-year-olds to 19.5%.

Diet and nutrition, as well as exposure to toxins, might be factors. Living in poverty is also associated with greater risk of hearing loss among youngsters, as children in lower-income families may not be getting adequate nutrition to support proper development of the auditory system.

Difficulty in hearing among youngsters has been linked to slower language development, poorer performance in school and lower self-esteem. And because social skills are dependent on language, previous studies have found that even slight hearing loss in elementary and high school students can result in progressively lower scores on communication tests and greater anxiety.

Mitochondria, the cellular power plants that generate virtually all the energy your body requires, play a vital role in keeping organs youthful and healthy, too. So what can you do to keep those mitochondria powered up? Try reaching for the green -- like green pepper, green kiwifruit, and green parsley. Green-pigmented foods like these are rich in pyrroloquinoline quinone -- or PQQ for short -- a powerful antioxidant that shields mitochondria from oxidative damage in such vital organs as the brain and heart.

Dietary PQQ may not only shield these precious mitochondria from damage but also promote the formation of new mitochondria. Studies also suggest that PQQ may protect against neurological damage caused by the common environmental toxin methylmercury, which has been linked to Parkinson's and Alzheimer's disease

In addition to certain greens, a number of items in the native Japanese diet contain PQQ as well, including miso, tofu, and natto (soybean paste). Coldwater fish like salmon, sardines, and tuna also contain appreciable amounts of PQQ. Just choose wild rather than farmed fish -- and canned chunk-light tuna over albacore -- to avoid high levels of methylmercury.

Eating some kinds of berries can help your brain stay healthy by helping to clean out toxic material linked to mental decline, including age-related memory loss, a new study shows.

Experts have long known that as the body ages it suffers “oxidative damage” and is less likely to be able to protect itself against cancer, heart disease and age-related mental decline.

But Poulose and his colleague found that strawberries, blueberries and acai berries activate brain cells called microglia. These cells, according to the ACS, act as the brain’s “housekeeper.” In a process called autophagy, they clean out “biochemical debris that would otherwise interfere with brain function.”

Drinking wine in moderate amounts may reduce the risk of decline in thinking skills in some people and may even protect against dementia, a new study shows.

women who reported drinking wine at least four times over a two-week period were at reduced risk of scoring poorly on the tests, compared with women who had less than one drink during the period. In addition, women who didn't drink any alcohol scored lowest on the tests. The average age of people in the study was 58, and none had suffered a stroke.

Every minute, there's a death due to cardiovascular disease in women, says Gregg Fonarow, director of the Ahmanson-UCLA Cardiomyopathy Center at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, who was not an author."This constitutes 422,000 deaths a year — more than cancer, respiratory disease, Alzheimer's and accidents combined," Fonarow says.The guidelines recommend that women:•Avoid smoking and exposure to environmental smoke.•Be physically active, getting 150 minutes a week of moderate exercise or 75 minutes a week of vigorous exercise.•Establish a comprehensive risk-reduction regime if diagnosed with heart disease or have a heart event.•Achieve a healthy body weight.•Eat a diet rich in fruits and vegetables; choose whole-grain, high-fiber foods; eat oily fish at least twice a week; limit saturated fat, cholesterol and sugar; avoid trans-fatty acids.•Consume omega-3 fatty acids by eating fish, or in capsule form if they have high cholesterol.

Drinking yogurt with extra vitamin D may help people with diabetes regulate their blood sugar, a study from Iran finds. In the trial, 90 adults with diabetes were divided into three groups, all given daily yogurt drinks: one group received plain yogurt, one got yogurt with extra vitamin D, and one was given yogurt with extra vitamin D and calcium.At the end of 12 weeks, "we found a relatively remarkable improvement" in blood sugar levels in the groups that got extra vitamin D, compared to the plain yogurt group, co-author Tirang Neyestani, associate professor at National Nutrition and Food Technology Research Institute in Iran, told Reuters Health in an e-mail.

Going back to the 1980s, numerous studies have linked vitamin D to a lowered risk of diabetes, however others have found no benefit. A recent report showed no link between women's blood levels of vitamin D and their risk of developing type 2 diabetes, for example. (See Reuters Health story of February 22, 2011.)Few studies have directly tested the theory by giving people vitamin D and then seeing how they compare over time in diabetes-related measurements with similar subjects who did not consume the vitamin.