Southern Diet Associated with Risk of Heart Disease

The Southern-style diet is known more for its flavor than its health benefits.

If fried chicken, butter rolls, and sweet tea sound like the perfect meal, you could be significantly raising your risk of having a heart attack.

New research from the American Heart Association found that people who regularly ate a traditional Southern diet such as fried foods, fatty foods, eggs, bacon, ham and sugary drinks, were at a higher risk for suffering a heart attack or heart-related death during the next 5.8 years. Previous research has also shown a link between the Southern diet and an increased risk for stroke.

“Regardless of your gender, race, or where you live, if you frequently eat a Southern-style diet you should be aware of your risk of heart disease and try to make some gradual changes to your diet,” said James M. Shikany, Dr.P.H. lead researcher and a nutritional epidemiologist at the University of Alabama at Birmingham’s Division of Preventive Medicine. “Try cutting down the number of times you eat fried foods or processed meats from every day to three days a week as a start, and try substituting baked or grilled chicken or vegetable-based foods.”

The study is one of the first to include a regionally and socioeconomically diverse population. Researchers compared the dietary habits of more than 17,000 white and African-American adults who live in different regions of the United States. After adjusting for a combination of demographic and lifestyle factors, along with energy intake, they found:

• People who most often ate foods conforming to the Southern dietary pattern had a 56 percent higher risk of heart disease compared to those who ate it less frequently.
• The highest consumers of the Southern diet tended to be male, African-American, living in the following southern states: North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia, Tennessee, Alabama, Mississippi, Arkansas and Louisiana.
• No other dietary pattern was associated with the risk of heart disease.

Source: American Heart Association

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