Food can Avoid Stroke says New Study

There has been a consensus that having too much fat in your diet can raise the risk of cardiovascular complications, including Stroke. The results of a new study suggest that’s not true.Preliminary research presented at the American Heart Association’s Scientific Sessions 2021 found that, while eating higher amounts of red meat, processed red meat, and non-dairy animal fat increases your risk of Stroke, eating more vegetable fat or polyunsaturated fat lowers your risk.

The findings are based on a 27-year study of more than 117,000 healthcare professionals. The participants were 50 years old on average—63% were women, 97% were white—and none had heart disease or cancer when the study began. Participants filled out food frequency questionnaires every four years to help calculate the amount, source, and types of fat they had in their diets over the past year.

The researchers then did calculations to help determine the participants’ long-term dietary intake and divided people into five groups based on how much fat they ate. During the study period, 6,189 participants had Stroke. People who ate the highest amount of non-dairy animal fat were 16 percent more likely than those who ate the least amount of non-dairy animal fat to have one.

People who ate the most vegetable fat and the most polyunsaturated fat were 12 percent less likely to have a Stroke than people who ate the least amounts of those fats. Additionally, people who ate at least one serving of “total red meat” every day had an eight percent higher risk of, and those who had a daily serving of processed red meat had a 12% higher risk. Overall, though, the researchers found that fat in dairy foods like cheese, butter, milk, ice cream, and cream was not linked with a higher risk of Stroke.