Breakfast reduces cardiovascular risk and obesity.

Recent research into the effects of breakfast on cardiovascular risk in Italians shows that individuals who eat breakfast have lower CVD risk, enjoy better physical health, and have nearly 40% lower risk of metabolic syndrome. Eating breakfast lowered the risk of having a higher BMI, abdominal obesity, systolic and diastolic blood pressure, blood glucose, triglycerides, total cholesterol, and C-reactive protein, all cardiovascular risk factors.

PositiveTip:  Eating a good breakfast can significantly reduce multiple CVD risk factors.

Misalignment between circadian rhythm and behavioral rhythm may increase disease risk.

Shift workers younger than 40 years of age were found to have significantly higher levels of cortisol ("stress" hormone) compared to their day worker counterparts. This small Dutch study also found that shift workers weighed significantly more. These observations could place them at higher risk of metabolic syndrome and cardiovascular disease.

PositiveTip: The lack of regularity in life, along with working outside of standard hours, may raise risks of disease. If possible, avoid these shifts.

Exercising longer and more frequently helps cardiac rehab patients lose more weight!

It seems in life that nothing worthwhile comes easily! A newly published research paper underscores this fact in finding the higher the energy expenditure of overweight patients in a cardiac rehabilitation program, the greater the improvement in risk.

Typical protocols result in little weight loss for the more than 80% overweight patients who enter cardiac rehabilitation programs. Investigators designed exercise programs which increased energy expenditure by 615 kcal per day compared to the 269 kcal increase in the control group. At five months those in the high-calorie exercise expenditure group had lost more than twice as much weight, and their insulin resistance was significantly better.