Heart Health Nutrition Counseling
The Importance of a Heart Healthy Diet
Your daily food choices can have a meaningful impact on your heart health. Whether your goal is lowering cholesterol, reducing blood pressure, improving triglycerides, or decreasing your risk of heart attack or stroke, nutrition can be a powerful tool. Our dietitians help you make realistic, sustainable changes that fit your lifestyle.
While there is no one right way to eat for cardiovascular health, it is generally recommended to eat fruits, vegetables, beans, lentils, whole grains and fish regularly. Things like saturated fat, trans fat, cholesterol, sodium, refined carbohydrates and sweetened beverages should be limited.¹ Specific heart healthy diets include plant-based diets, the Mediterranean diet, and the DASH diet.¹˒²
Why You Should Meet With a Dietitian for Heart Health
Many of our patients are looking for ways to better manage their cardiovascular health outside of just adding more medications. While we cannot guarantee that dietary changes can replace your medications, a heart healthy diet has shown to decrease the risk of heart attack and stroke.²
Not only is meeting with a dietitian cost-effective,² it has been shown to improve total cholesterol, LDL (“bad”) cholesterol, triglycerides, blood pressure, risk of stroke, and weight, and BMI (Body Mass Index).²˒³
It can be challenging to cut through all the information about what to eat and not eat when it comes to staying healthy. Meet with a seasoned professional to not only get evidence-based information, but personalized advice that fits your food preferences, budget, and schedule.
Heart Health Conditions We Can Help With
High Cholesterol & Dyslipidemia
Many of our patients come to us looking for an alternative way to decrease their cholesterol levels. While some people do require statins to get their cholesterol to a healthy level, others see significant cholesterol lowering with dietary changes alone.
If your healthcare provider is recommending a statin, but you are hesitant about starting one, we highly recommend working with a dietitian to guide you on other ways to decrease cholesterol levels. This allows you and your healthcare provider to make informed decisions about your treatment plan, knowing you've also adequately addressed nutrition and lifestyle.
High Triglycerides
Triglyceride numbers are usually quite responsive to nutrition - you can often see a significant drop in triglyceride levels with just a handful of changes. In fact, lifestyle management should be the first treatment for high triglycerides as it can decrease levels more than 70% in some patients.²
The American Heart Association 2026 guidelines recommend that most individuals with high triglycerides be referred to a registered dietitian nutritionist.² Working with a dietitian is especially important to reduce the risk of pancreatitis in people with very high triglyceride levels.²
Hypertension (High Blood Pressure)
There are many different nutrition strategies that can help improve blood pressure. Most people understand the importance of consuming less sodium and salt, but there are many other changes that can help, such as increasing the intake of potassium, magnesium, and calcium. Our dietitians can walk you through what foods can help you achieve and maintain a healthy blood pressure.
Heart Disease, Heart Attack & Stroke
If you've already experienced a heart attack or stroke or have been diagnosed with heart disease, nutrition remains an important part of your long-term care. Our dietitians will help you build eating habits that support your heart while fitting your lifestyle.
Ready to Take the Next Step with a Cardiac Dietitian?
Are you ready to make an appointment? Give us a call, or schedule online here: online scheduling
Have more questions? Find out information on the following:
What to Expect from Nutrition Counseling
References