Bill Clinton's Story.
From Couch Potato & Junk Food Aficionado to Plant-Based Booster
In spite of having the best health care from the country's top physicians, Clinton still ended up with quadruple bypasses, two stents, & medication. And even Clinton knew he was heading into trouble if he didn't do something serious about changing his diet.
Clinton had the trifecta of heart disease risk: he had a family history of heart disease, he was overweight & out-of-shape, and he was eating all the wrong foods.
When Clinton's stents failed in February of 2010, his doctor said, "This isn't a result of diet or exercise--it's a mechanical failure of stents." But statins, stents, & the Mediterranean Diet aren't always enough to stop heart disease. And moderation & pharmaceuticals aren't enough to stop the onslaught of atherosclerosis.
Last year Clinton decided to hit the books & read what the medical literature had to say about preventing and reversing heart disease through diet. He discovered that there is only one way to do this--a strict plant-based diet loaded with green leafy vegetables, and without meat, chicken, fish, dairy, or added oils.
The two physicians who pioneered this type of treatment are Dr. Caldwell B. Esselstyn, Jr. and Dr. Dean Ornish. With nothing to lose, Clinton decided to conduct his own personal clinical trial.
For over a year he's been eating 100% plant-based.
No dairy, no meat, no fish, and almost no oil.
First of all, Clinton unabashedly says, "I like the stuff I eat. And if anything, I'm getting stricter about my diet as time goes on." He's lost 27 pounds, all his blood tests are good, he has more energy, needs less sleep, and feels great. He's almost down to his lowest weight since high school--185 pounds.
The Heart Attack Proof Diet
Dr. Caldwell B. Esselstyn, Jr. has been teaching patients to prevent & reverse heart disease through a plant-based no-oil diet since 1985.
According to Esselstyn, heart disease is a food-borne illness, and one's risk of having a heart attack is not sealed in stone by one's family history or genetics. If you change what you eat--and you can make yourself heart-attack proof. Click
here to learn more.
Esselstyn looked at the diets of indigenous people around the world. In the communities where no heart disease existed, it turned out that the people were eating a mostly plant-based low-fat diet: The Papua New Guinea highlanders, the Tarahumara Indians of Mexico, and some rural Chinese.
What do you eat on this diet?
Vegetables-lots of green leafy ones to restore & heal the endothelial lining of your blood vessels. Kale, Swiss Chard, Cilantro, Collards, Bok Choy, Parsley, Spinach, Broccoli, Brussel Sprouts, Cauliflower
Whole fruit
Whole grains
Beans/Legumes; "light" tofu--cautious use of low-fat soy meat substitutes. Many are highly processed, high-fat junk food.
Gupta followed up with his own research, checking the medical literature for sound studies on the use of plant-based diets to prevent & reverse heart disease. He was impressed with Dr. Esselstyn's research at the Cleveland Clinic.
5 years later no patients who followed the diet had another cardiovascular event
Three-quarters of Esselstyn's patients saw their blockages reduced.
Dr. Erin Michos, a cardiologist at the Ciccarone Center for the Prevention of Heart Disease at Johns Hopkins University, says diet can reverse heart disease, but some people just aren't willing to make the necessary changes.
Gupta points out that
Dr. Esselstyn's diet prescription runs counter to the powerful lobbies of the meat, dairy, & egg industries--not to mention our fast-food culture. Could that be another reason that it hasn't gone mainstream?
Most doctors & their families eat meat themselves, making them less likely to offer a plant-based diet as a prescription to prevent heart disease.
Two Patients Who Chose Diet Over Surgery to Prevent Another Heart Attack
The 41 year-old Male
He didn't smoke, was in good shape, and ate well. His was a case of bad genes.
At age 31 he already had eight stents placed in his arteries. At age 41 he had four more.
Clearly, stents weren't working for him. He decided to contact Dr. Esselstyn after learning about his successes last September through Wolf Blitzer's CNN interview.
No surprise that his doctors thought Esselstyn's diet was too extreme. "Unnecessary," they told him. But after having multiple stents he was losing confidence in their advice.
Next Step. The Esselstyn Diet.
He attended Dr. Esselstyn's one day session at the Cleveland Clinic in December 2010 and has religiously followed the diet since then. (Learn more here: "What I Learned From Dr. Caldwell and Ann Esselstyn's Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease "School")
Since December Dr. Esselstyn's patient has lost 48 pounds.
Last June, before changing his diet, his cholesterol was total of 208, LDL of 93, HDL of 41, and triglycerides of 368.
His most recent test results are: total cholesterol of 89, LDL of 19, HDL of 53, and triglycerides of 83.
The transformation is nothing short of amazing.
This CNN article wasn't part of Gupta's documentary, but part of series of articles leading up to show. Don't miss reading the entire inspirational story
here.
Don't shoot the messenger
, enjoy the read.