Fasting Good For Your Heart

Risk of coronary disease is shown to be lower.

Written by: Cielestia Calbay

Regular fasting may boost heart health, according to Salt Lake City doctors, who studied the relationship between periodic fasting and cardiovascular disease.

Two hundred participants underwent angiography, a diagnostic test that takes an X-ray of the blood vessels and heart chambers and determines if the person has coronary heart disease. Doctors expected the participants to have a relatively high rate of fasting since 90 percent of the patients were Mormon, a faith that encourages its members to fast for one day a month.

At the end of the study, they found that those who regularly fasted had a 58 percent lower risk of coronary disease compared with those who didn’t fast.

Researchers say the findings are important because they affirm the results of a study published in 2008 in The American Journal of Cardiology, which found a similar association between fasting and heart disease among 448 patients.

[sig:CielestiaCalbay]