Health Claims

The diet score includes a special section for 'smart foods' like turmeric, green tea, and olive oil — things that might help the heart, even if they're not traditional staples.

Descriptive

Scientists created a new food scorecard just for people in India that checks how healthy their eating habits are by looking at things like how much rice or bread they eat, whether they have sweets after meals, what kind of milk fat they use, and where they get their healthy fats — and it counts food in portions per 1,000 calories to make it easier to report accurately.

Descriptive

In men in Indian cities who have high cholesterol, eating a healthier diet for 12 weeks might help lower a marker of body inflammation, but we can’t be sure yet because the results weren’t strong enough to count as proof.

Correlational

In Indian men living in cities who have high cholesterol, those who eat healthier according to a special diet score tend to have less body fat, lower weight, and less body inflammation — and those with the worst scores have the highest levels of these risk factors, suggesting the diet score might help spot heart disease risks.

Correlational

In young to middle-aged Indian men living in cities who have high triglycerides and low good cholesterol, eating more fiber, protein, and vitamin C while eating less fat and sugar is linked to a higher score on a special diet quiz—meaning the quiz might be good at spotting healthy eating habits that help heart health.

Correlational

Even if you exercise a lot and meet the recommended activity guidelines, having very bad insulin resistance can still make you more likely to die from any cause — meaning exercise alone isn’t enough to completely protect you from serious metabolic problems.

Correlational

If you have insulin resistance, doing more than the recommended amount of exercise won’t help you live longer or avoid heart disease any better than sticking to the standard exercise guidelines.

Causal

Doing a moderate to intense workout for about 262 minutes a week is the sweet spot for protecting your heart — going more than that doesn’t help any more.

Correlational

People with higher insulin resistance—measured by a specific blood test—are much more likely to have heart problems or die from any cause, even if they’ve never had heart disease before.

Correlational

If you're an adult without heart disease and you get 150 to 300 minutes of brisk exercise each week, you're less likely to die from any cause — especially if your body has trouble processing sugar. This amount of activity might help reduce the danger that comes with metabolic issues.

Correlational

The usual advice to exercise a certain amount each week might not be the best for people with serious heart problems — they might need a different plan.

Descriptive

If you swap some of your sitting time for activities like brisk walking or jogging, you might give your heart a bigger boost—especially if you're already at higher risk for heart problems.

Correlational

If you're at high risk for heart problems, doing more than an hour of intense exercise a week might not help your heart as much as doing less — it could even be less beneficial.

Correlational

If you're at very high risk for heart problems, doing just 42 minutes of intense exercise a week seems to give you the best heart health boost — doing more might not help as much and could even reduce the benefits.

Correlational

People who move more—especially those who do brisk walking, running, or other intense activities—tend to have fewer heart problems, and this benefit is even stronger for people who are already at high risk for heart disease.

Correlational

People who sleep between 6 and 9 hours a night seem to have the lowest risk of heart problems in the next 10 years — those who sleep less or more than that have higher risk, at least in Hispanic/Latino adults.

Correlational

People who sleep too little or too much are more likely to die sooner, even if they don’t have severe sleep apnea — which suggests that how long you sleep might be harmful all on its own.

Correlational

People who say they sleep either too little (6 hours or less) or too much (9 hours or more) tend to have a higher chance of having a heart problem in the next 10 years, compared to those who sleep between 6 and 9 hours — at least in this group of Hispanic/Latino patients.

Correlational

People in this group who say they sleep 9 hours or more each night are nearly four times more likely to die from any cause than those who sleep 6 to 9 hours, even when you account for heart problems and sleep apnea.

Correlational

People in this group who say they sleep 6 hours or less each night are more than twice as likely to die from any cause compared to those who sleep 6 to 9 hours—even if they have heart problems or sleep apnea.

Correlational

People who say they sleep too little or too much are more likely to die from heart problems, but only those who actually sleep too little (measured by devices) show a clear link—so sleeping a lot might just mean you’re sick or your sleep is bad, not that you’re sleeping too much.

Correlational

People who sleep more, as measured by devices, tend to live longer and have fewer heart-related deaths—even those who sleep more than 8 hours don’t seem to be at higher risk.

Correlational

People often think they slept more or less than they actually did, so when they fill out sleep surveys, their answers don’t match what machines measure — making those surveys less trustworthy for big health studies.

Correlational

People who sleep too little (4 hours or less) or too much (more than 8 hours) tend to have a higher risk of dying from any cause or heart disease, while those who sleep 7 to 8 hours have the lowest risk—this might mean that how long you think you slept is more about your health problems or poor sleep quality than how well you actually rested.

Correlational