4 Reasons Why Dieting Is Bad For Your Heart

Studies show that up to 98% of diets fail.  According to new research, dieting might increase your risk of a heart attack as much as smoking.  In this article, I share four reasons why dieting is bad for your heart.

Dieting Is Bad For Your Heart Study

Unless you were on a media fast this past week, you probably heard about the dieting study the whole world was talking about.  This study was done by Dr. Sripal Bangalore and colleagues from New York University and was published in the most prestigious medical journal in the world.

To better understand the effects of yo-yo dieting, or weight cycling, on the heart, they studied 9,509 people.  I should mention that these 9,509 people all had known heart disease so it was definitely a high risk group of people.

They then compared those people with the highest fluctuation in weight (weight loss followed by gaining the weight back) to those who were consistently overweight.  Below are their four findings of why dieting is bad for your heart.

1. Dieting Increased Heart Attack Risk by 117%

As up to 98% of diets fail, almost everyone who has ever gone on a diet could be considered a "yo-yo dieter."  This is because when people go off their diet the weight comes right back.

In this study, weight loss followed by gaining the weight back, increased the heart attack risk by 117%.  To put this into perspective, other studies have shown that smoking increases your heart attack risk by up to 124%.

Of course, these are two different studies and it would be like comparing apples to oranges.  However, I shared this to point out that the magnitude of risk might be comparable.

2. Dieting Increased Stroke Risk by 136%

In many ways, a stroke is like a heart attack.  With a heart attack, one of the arteries to the heart suddenly gets blocked off and the heart muscle downstream from the blockage dies.

In most strokes, the same thing happens.  An artery feeding blood to the brain suddenly becomes blocked and the brain tissue downstream of the blockage dies.  Thus, anything that increases the risk of a heart attack would also be expected to increase the risk of a stroke.

3. Dieting Increased Diabetes Risk by 78%

In my mind, this was probably the most striking finding of this study.  Somehow, the diabetes risk of weight fluctuation was worse than just being overweight all of the time.  This finding raises the question that perhaps yo-yo dieting somehow damages the body's metabolism.

4. Dieting Increased Premature Death Risk by 124%

As heart disease remains the number one cause of death in the Western world, it comes as no surprise that anything that increases your risk of a heart attack would also increase your risk of a premature death.  As  I have consistently shared in previous blog articles, living a heart healthy life is the key to avoiding most chronic medical problems and living a long life.

Do other studies show dieting is bad for your heart?

You can never believe the results of a single study.  Too many things can go wrong with a study that could give you false results.  Thus, before you accept anything as "truth," you want to make sure multiple credible studies have all come to the same conclusion.

With regards to weight cycling and the risk of heart disease, studies from as far back as 1991 have shown that dieting is bad for your heart.  I should point out that not all studies have shown a risk from weight cycling.  This is likely because these studies were much smaller and didn't include high risk people.

Based on the data available, unless you can keep the weight loss off long-term, dieting is bad for your heart.  In younger and healthier people, the risk of dieting probably isn't high enough to make any measurable difference.