Coronary Risk Factors and its Reduction by Plant-Based Diet with Emphasis on Diabetes: A Preliminary Report

Abstract

Background: The common coronary risk factors are hypertension, hyperlipidemia, obesity and diabetes. These can be improved with Plant-Based diet. Objective: To reduce coronary risk factors by Plant-Based diet with emphasis on diabetes. Methods: In the first part (Part A), the subjects are 805 patients treated for hypertension, hyperlipidemia, obesity, diabetes, and coronary artery disease (CAD) from January 2012 through October 2015. Primary prevention group (without CAD) consisting of 423 patients are compared to the Secondary prevention group (with CAD) consisting of 382 patients (Table 1). The second part (Part B) is to determine the effect of plant-based diet in reducing coronary risk factors in 20 patients with diabetes, divided in to two groups, dietary compliant vs. dietary non-compliant group. Results: Part A: Analysis of risk factors for CAD shows that risk ratio for hypertension is 1.4803 (p = 0.0002), hyperlipidemia 1.9118 (p = 0.0023), diabetes 1.5357 (p < 0.0001), obesity 0.8637 (p = 0.0565), age ≥ 65 years 1.4665 (p < 0.0001), male sex 1.6509 (p < 0.0001) (Table 2). Gender related analysis of CAD risk factors indicated higher incidence of diabetes in females compared to males (Table 3). Part B: In the diabetic cohort analysis of risk factors between dietary compliant and non-compliant group (Table 4) showed an average drop in HbA1c of 3.03% vs. decrease of 0.03%, p = 0.0049, total cholesterol decreased by 68.8 mg/dl vs. increase of 13.2 mg/dl, p = 0.0018, weight decreased by 9.02 kg vs. increase of 1.78 kg, p = 0.0071, BMI decreased by 3.28 kg/m2 vs. increase by 1.22 kg/m2, p = 0.0071. There was no significant difference for systolic and diastolic blood pressures between the two groups (Table 5). The reduction in HbA1c was associated with reduction in the number of antidiabetic medications only in the compliant group and this is unchanged in the non-compliant groups, a decrease from 2.1 to 1.2 vs. no change from 2.6 to 2.6, p = 0.0753 (Table 6). Conclusion: Plant-based diet improved coronary risk factors, including decrease in HbA1c in the patients with diabetes. This is associated with the need for reduced number of antidiabetic medications.