Excess belly fat can be dangerous because it surrounds internal organs and puts you at greater risk for developing several kinds of health problems, including heart disease, diabetes and liver problems.
Losing weight — even if some pounds are gained back — may help your heart over the long term, according to a study published Tuesday in the journal Circulation: Cardiovascular Quality and Outcomes.
Visceral fat can also directly affect the organ around which it's wrapped. Our new research, published in September in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology, found visceral fat around the heart produces biochemical molecules that can make the heart beat erratically.
Excess weight can lead to fatty material building up in your arteries (the blood vessels that carry blood to your organs). If the arteries that carry blood to your heart get damaged and clogged, it can lead to a heart attack.
However, too much visceral fat can be dangerous for your health. Visceral fat is sometimes called “active fat” because it plays an active role in how your body functions. Too much visceral fat can lead to serious health issues such as diabetes, heart disease and stroke.
For women, a waist measurement of more than 35 inches (89 centimeters) signals an unhealthy amount of belly fat and a greater risk of health problems. In general, though, the greater the waist measurement, the higher the health risks.
Visceral fat has been linked to metabolic disturbances and increased risk for cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes. In women, it is also associated with breast cancer and the need for gallbladder surgery.
Exercise and weight loss can help to reverse heart failure when it's started early enough. However, losing weight and keeping fit is not always enough.
Pericardial fat, sometimes called “fatty heart,” is a type of visceral fat. Visceral fat wraps around your abdominal organs deep inside your body and produce proteins that cause harmful inflammation. The best way to tell where and how much visceral fat you have is with an imaging test, such as a CT scan or MRI.
Saturated fats raise your LDL (bad) cholesterol. High LDL cholesterol increases your risk for heart disease and stroke. Weight gain. Many high-fat foods such as pizza, baked goods, and fried foods have a lot of saturated fat.
Right now, scientists believe one link has to do with the compounds gut bacteria produce when they break down certain foods. Having the wrong balance of bugs may mean more byproducts that raise cholesterol levels and harm blood vessels.
The heavier you are, and the more fat you have on your body, the greater the strain on your heart. Obesity forces your heart to pump harder to distribute the blood throughout your body, and it causes your heart to beat faster. It can lower your “HDL” or good cholesterol and raise your “LDL” or bad cholesterol.
BLOOD VESSELS
Losing weight reduces the workload on your heart. Blood vessels supply your heart with the blood it needs to keep pumping. As you shed pounds, there isn't fat sitting around and forming plaque that can build up and clog your coronary arteries, eventually causing a heart attack.
Both resistance and endurance were shown to reduce fat around the heart, but only resistance training reduced pericardial fat specifically. The results suggest that the best way to remove fat around the heart is through resistance training, which targets two types of heart fat.
Studies have shown that even a 5 percent drop – regardless of your BMI – will help your heart. So, if you are starting at 200 pounds, you'll start to reap health benefits by dropping just 10 pounds. Your blood pressure may drop along with your triglycerides, total and “bad” cholesterol.
Being very overweight puts you at risk for heart disease even if you seem otherwise healthy—that is, even if you don't have high blood pressure, high cholesterol or diabetes, says Johns Hopkins cardiologist Chiadi Ndumele, M.D. New research shows that it's unwise to be lulled into a false sense of security about your ...
Coronary heart disease cannot be cured but treatment can help manage the symptoms and reduce the chances of problems such as heart attacks. Treatment can include: lifestyle changes, such as regular exercise and stopping smoking.
(Reuters Health) - Adults with a healthy weight but a sedentary lifestyle may have the same risk for heart attacks or strokes as people who are overweight, a recent study suggests.
Studies show walking is one of the best ways to shed belly fat, in less time than you think. Researchers reviewed 40 years of studies on exercise and belly fat and found that just 2 1/2 hours of brisk walking a week--about 20 minutes a day--can shrink your belly by about 1 inch in 4 weeks.
While there isn't one magic food that will melt away belly fat, studies have reported certain foods have special belly-fat-burning benefits, such as avocado, artichokes, whole grains, kefir, green tea, eggs, peanuts and chickpeas.
If you want to know if you have too much belly fat, you should also consider your waist measurement. A healthy waist circumference for men is less than 94cm (37 inches), while for women it's less than 80cm (32 inches).