Dr. Esselstyn's Study on Heart Diseased Patients

Dr. Caldwell B. Esselstyn, Jr. is a doctor at the Cleveland Clinic, which is the top ranked hospital in the country for cardiac care, according the US News and World Report. Dr. Esselstyn is a highly acclaimed doctor who started a study in 1985 on the affects of a plant-based diet full of whole grain foods.

His book, Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease, documents much of his research, but to summarize for you, I am paraphrasing the results of his study from Dr. Campbell's The China Study.

Also, the patients on the diet stopped experiencing heart problems and their arteries actually began to unclog, reversing the damage of heart disease!

He conducted this study by gathering a group of 23 people with coronary disease who had suffered through 49 heart issues over the past eight years (including angina, bypass surgery, heart attacks, strokes, and angioplasty.) The study lasted five years, and Dr. Esselstyn met with his patients every two weeks to discuss their food diaries, record blood pressure and weight, and take blood tests.

The diet was free of all added fats and almost all animal products (at first they were told to eat skim milk and nonfat yogurt, but a few years into the program Dr. Esselstyn told them to remove milk and yogurt as well.)

Amazing, right?!! Those are the same people who had gone through 49 coronary events before the study. Now they had none! It is amazing, but it makes so much sense. A healthy, plant-based diet is what humans were made to eat, not all these crazy meat and dairy-based diets.

Guess what else happened with those patients... their heart disease not only stopped progressing, but it actually reversed as well!!

Of the 18 members in the study, eleven of them had their hearts x-rayed, and Dr. Esselstyn found that 70% of them had new openings in their clogged arteries. This is absolutely astounding data since these patients did not take any medicine and simply followed a healthy diet.

You remember that five people dropped out of Dr. Esselstyn's first study, right? Do you know what happened to them ten years after the start of the study? They had ten new heart issues!!

Of course, I am not excited that those poor people had to deal with the heart problems, but I am excited that the evidence is so clear.

Good diet... no heart disease.

Bad diet... heart disease.

We have so much more control over our future than we think we do.

Now, I know that changing your diet is a drag, especially if you are older and know exactly what you like to eat, but let's think about it this way...

If someone came up to you and offered you a pill that would almost guarantee that you would never have a heart attack, stroke, chest pain, or any other heart problem, as long as you took it faithfully every day, would you take it? How about if that pill didn't cost you any additional money?

You would be crazy not to. Think about how much more enjoyment you would get out of life if you were healthy to the end, instead of dealing with chest pain and heart attacks at every turn of the road.

Of course, healthy eating is just like this magic pill, except it's not fictional. The adjustment to any new eating habit can take some time, but wouldn't you admit that it might be worth it?

You might be in a place where you could take it slowly too... maybe you are young and haven't seen any of the effects of your eating habits yet. So you could just change a few meals a week, or one a day. See how you feel and then take away a few more.

Done with Esselstyn? Return to Vegan Disease Prevention

Return to the Home Page