Study: Nuts fight heart disease

LOMA LINDA, Calif., May 18 (UPI) -- Eating tree nuts helps lower blood lipid levels and may help heart health, a U.S. researcher says.

High blood lipid levels -- mostly made up of fatty acids and cholesterol -- are a major risk factor for cardiovascular disease.

Dr. Joan Sabate of Loma Linda University says the lipids-lowering benefits of eating nuts were seen especially in those who weighed less. There was a benefit to eating as low as a 1-ounce serving per day, but greatest benefits occurred when 20 percent of daily calories came from nuts, Sabate says.

Twenty percent of daily calories in a typical 2,000-calorie diet would equal 400 calories of nuts, or about 2.4 ounces of nuts -- about 120 pistachios, representatives of Paramount Farms, a pistachio grower and processor in California, said.

Sabate and colleagues analyzed pooled data from 25 nut consumption trials conducted in seven countries among 583 men and women.

The study, published in the Archives of Internal Medicine, finds a diet containing nuts, including pistachios, lowered total and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol levels, in addition to triglycerides.