Aspirin Therapy and the Heart-Part 1

Articles by Dr. Erdman are for informational purposes, and are not to be taken as specific medical advice.

 

For many years, doctors have been prescribing aspirin therapy as a cheap, effective way to reduce cardiovascular events and improve survival after a heart attack. Neither of these is true.

Chewing two aspirin during a heart attack event has been shown to be very effective in reducing damage to the heart.  You must chew them, and it must be during the event.  That is not what we are talking about here.

Even low dose aspirin therapy has serious side effects that, just like statin drugs for cholesterol, overshadow any supposed benefit. The evidence in support of aspirin has always been weak, and over the last decade it has become even weaker.

Fats and Your Heart

Articles by Dr. Erdman are for informational purposes, and are not to be taken as specific medical advice.

 

Over the last several years of writing these articles, I’ve hit the topic of saturated fats, cholesterol and your heart health quite a few times. The school of thought that saturated fats are good for you continues to be proven correct. Even more recent research has come in on the side of the healthiness of saturated fats. The recent research also points to the real villain that fries (no pun intended) your heart, that being trans fats.

Back in February, the US government’s Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee surprisingly eliminated warnings about dietary cholesterol and reversed their long standing nutrition policy by concluding that dietary fats have no ill effects on the heart.