True Heart Disease Prevention (and Reversal)

If you want a healthy cardiovascular system, you absolutely must pay attention to the health of your blood vessels. You have approximately 60,000 miles of blood vessels in your body. More than just pipes that carry blood, the blood vessels play an essential role in your health.

The blood vessels are regulated by the endothelial cells, a single layer of cells that make up the innermost layer of the vessels. These cells come into direct contact with the contents on the inside of the vessels. This specialized layer of cells is a major player in blood flow, platelet aggregation (clotting), and blood vessel tone (how the blood vessels dilate and contract).

In addition, the EGX stimulates the production of nitric oxide (NO). NO is an essential gas that signals the blood vessels to dilate or widen. You can imagine that the flexibility of the blood vessels is extremely important when it comes to increasing circulation and ensuring oxygen delivery during exercise, sexual activity, and other times of higher demand.

NO is necessary in order to maintain normal blood pressure, healthy sexual function, improved muscle strength and exercise endurance, quick recovery, and supports healthy blood flow.

Ensuring a healthy endothelium and EGX is the number one factor to keeping your cardiovascular system healthy. You want to avoid heart disease? Focus on this! Because the degradation of the EGX and the endothelium is the very first step in the pathogenesis of cardiovascular disease.

The EGX and the endothelial lining is very delicate and is easily damaged, especially from our typical American lifestyle. The most important risk factors that damage the EGX and the endothelium are:

• High blood sugar, including but not limited to pre-diabetes and diabetes (fasting blood sugar at the high level of normal range on a blood test is not normal),
• Poor diet (I’m looking at you industrial seed oils, processed foods, and sugar)
• Environmental toxin exposure (chemicals from the air, water, food, cleaning products, person care products, etc.)
• Inflammation

Our predominant medical system ignores these risk factors and instead focuses on cholesterol and blood clots. While these are also important to address, both cholesterol and blood clots accumulate in the blood vessels and stick to the blood vessel walls only when the EGX layer is insufficient and the endothelial lining is damaged. Cholesterol sticks to the damaged blood vessels in an attempt to patch up and smooth over those areas. Blood clots form and block blood vessels when the EGX no longer provides that slime layer to allow the blood to flow smoothly through the vessels.

When the EGX and endothelial lining are damaged, there is a lack of NO and the blood vessels can no longer dilate appropriately, leaving a more narrow opening for the contents of the vessels to flow through and a build up of blood pressure, further increasing the likelihood of clotting, stroke, and heart attack

While you diligently work, with me if needed, on reducing the risk factors that you now know damage the EGX and the endothelial lining, you can also take some supplements. Here are two of the most important supplements for your cardiovascular health: