Homocysteine: The Amino Acid that Causes Heart Disease

If you truly want to enjoy vibrant health and active longevity it’s vital that you identify and eliminate the underlying CAUSES of illness… rather than simply treating the symptoms.

For many years, mainstream medicine has focused on “high cholesterol” as a cause of heart disease. This is not true. At best, elevated cholesterol levels are a symptom of the disease.

On the other hand, inflammation could be considered a cause of heart disease. But even that doesn’t tell the whole story, because inflammation is also a symptom of something else.

Too much sugar and refined carbohydrates in the diet are certainly one cause of inflammation. Another source of inflammation is a compound called homocysteine.

Homocysteine: A Little Known Cause of Hearty Attack and Stroke

Homocysteine is produced naturally in your body as protein in the diet is broken down. This compound performs necessary and useful functions.

However, certain co-factors must also be present to break down homocysteine. If these co-factors are missing, homocysteine accumulates in the blood and can literally “sear” the walls of your arteries.

This is one of the true underlying causes of inflammation. As high homocysteine levels burn the lining of blood vessels, plaques form as the body attempts to heal the damage.

As these plaques rupture and break off in later years, they cause heart attacks and strokes..

Fortunately, the solution for high homocysteine is very simple…

Slash Homocysteine with These 3 Nutrients

A diet that is rich in folate and vitamin B6 and vitamin B12, helps the body to rapidly metabolize it. Whereas a diet that is deficient in these nutrients (which is all too common) will cause homocysteine to build up to dangerous levels.

The Journal of Nutrition has reported that folate, B6 and B12 can effectively lower homocysteine in more than 95% of cases.

Those who have existing heart disease or high homocysteine levels (there is a simple blood test for this) may wish to supplement their diet with nutritional products that contain these nutrients. But your first line of defense should always be the foods you eat.

The best food sources of folate, B6 and B12 are: