Common Barriers to a Heart Healthy Diet: Results from Our Heart Month Survey

Podcast Transcript

Announcer:

Welcome to Love Your Heart, brought to you by Cleveland Clinic's Sydell and Arnold Miller Family Heart, Vascular and Thoracic Institute. These podcasts will help you learn more about your heart, thoracic and vascular systems, ways to stay healthy and information about diseases and treatment options. Enjoy.

Natalie Salvatore, RN: 

Hello, my name is Natalie Salvatore. I'm a registered nurse in the Heart, Vascular and Thoracic Institute at Cleveland Clinic. February is Heart Month, and Cleveland Clinic did a survey of 1,000 Americans to see what are some of the biggest challenges that our patients and community have to living a heart healthy lifestyle and especially a heart healthy diet. So, I'm happy to be joined today by Julia Zumpano, a Registered Dietician with Cleveland Clinic in the Department of Preventive Cardiology. Julia, welcome.

Julia Zumpano, RD:

Thank you for having me today, Natalie.

Natalie Salvatore, RN:

So, one of the first things that this survey found was that cost is an extremely powerful barrier to the community being able to eat healthy foods.

Julia Zumpano, RD:

So, I think this is a common misconception, that cost can be a barrier. It is no surprise that healthy food can cost more when compared to some unhealthier snack foods. Although, when you really look at your grocery bill as a whole, you really can end up saving, if not breaking even, if you replace your snack foods with healthy food choices. And the way that we would do that is we look at maybe what items we are adding on our grocery list that may not be serving us well, such as sodas or granola bars or potato chips or even some condiments that might not be serving us well, like some dressings or sauces. So, we want to look at some of those unhealthy, more processed items that we're consuming and purchasing and how much money we're actually spending on those. And you can replace those with healthy food items and use the money that you're not spending on some of those foods that, again, won't serve our heart health as well as the healthier option.

Swapping out some soda for maybe having some extra fruit and vegetables in your diet or taking out the sauce to buy maybe a better-quality bread or some more grains in your diet. So, a lot of the times we don't pay attention to how our money is allotted in our grocery bill. So really focusing on the whole foods first, so really focusing on categorizing them from the healthiest foods and then maybe leaving some of those treats and less healthy items at the bottom of the list. And if you do have money left over, they can be included in there and then, again, consumed in moderation. But really trying to focus on the healthy food first and then really knowing that you'll have all the high-quality foods that you need first and foremost. And then it will also help you meet your health goals by minimizing processed foods.

So, there are also other ways to save costs, for instance, to look at coupons and sales and price compare at different grocery stores. Although this can be a little bit more time consuming, it really does save money in the end. And then you get comfortable and familiar with which stores may have certain items at a lesser cost. So, I think that's also very helpful too. If you have the ability to buy in bulk, buying 18 eggs versus a dozen, buying bulk like a case of a canned beans or going to some of those stores that offer more bulk services where you can get more but it's at a lesser cost. So, if you have the ability to store some of those food items and can rotate through them, that's another great way to save money. So, I do think it's a very common misconception.

And when you're comparing maybe a healthy item to a less healthy item, I do feel that it can seem that healthier food items can be more costly, but when you really use whole foods as a comparison, I don't think you'll find that to be the case. I think commonly we're looking at maybe a whole grain organic granola compared to a traditional cereal, and the granola maybe twice the price of a cereal. But really, do we need either of those items? Why don't we just buy a canister of some oats and make some fresh oatmeal instead? Even those snacky foods or packaged foods that are being marketed as healthy can also be very, very pricey, and they really take away from the whole purpose of what we're trying to do: consume more whole foods.

Natalie Salvatore, RN:

Wow, thank you. So, one of the other things that the survey found, which talking about cost could be appealing, is many fast-food restaurants have value or discount items. And the survey found that almost half of Americans, so 45 percent of those surveyed, said that they get fast food at least once a week.

Julia Zumpano, RD:

So that's not surprising. And we live in a very busy world. Anyone with a family or working, we're overworked. We're underpaid. I think we're just in a society where everything has to be very quick and convenient for us to sustain our normal lives and to be able to fulfill all the needs that are put in front of us these days. So fast food seems to be a very simple, cost-effective option for people who are busy. Certainly, we can put in fast food if it's necessary, but those lower cost food items are typically the least healthy items on the menu. So, we want to keep that in mind. If you are going to choose fast food once a week, and I would not suggest it any more than that, I would really focus on maybe even saving a little bit of money to be able to purchase some of the better-quality items on the menus, maybe grilled chicken or a salad or a broth-based soup or maybe a fruit cup or a yogurt. So, something, again, certainly not deep fried, not breaded, as minimally processed as you can get at a fast-food restaurant. Planning ahead. A heart healthy lifestyle has a lot to do with planning ahead. And then planning ahead, again, can also minimize your need for fast food, but if it's necessary, definitely avoiding those lower cost items.

Natalie Salvatore, RN:

And I can see how fast food would be convenient while you're out and about and on the run. Something else that the survey found was that time to prepare and knowledge of preparing. So, one, again, making that time to prepare food and have those arranged snacks already but also the knowledge and recipes. What can you help our patients with in that regard?

Julia Zumpano, RD:

Yeah, so it's a lot of meal prep. So, meal prep can really help out when times are busy. If you can prep some core meals on the weekend or on your day off to have ready in the fridge or freezer for you when you are really pushed for time, that's going to be very helpful. Having a couple really quick, easy, go-to meals is also really helpful. One that I do that's pretty simple is making my veggie soup. So, using a low sodium vegetable or chicken broth, a bag of frozen vegetables and a can of low sodium beans. So, throwing all those together with some spices and seasonings can get you a very quick, easy vegetable-based soup. I oftentimes even like to make it a full, complete meal and cook up some chicken in there. I even can buy frozen chicken breasts and throw them in and have them boil with the broth. So, it can be a very, very simple meal that the whole family can enjoy, and it's very cost effective. It's a very inexpensive meal to prepare, and it can last a long time and go a long way.

Having some go-tos. So, I always tell my patients to have at least four quick, easy meals that you have on hand and all the ingredients in your cupboard or freezer, things that you know can keep forever, having those core ingredients to be able to make those quick and healthy meals, having some prepped meals in your freezer or fridge already ready to go, and even in a pinch, having some even frozen options available, like I mentioned, frozen vegetables or frozen chicken breast or frozen fish. Something that can be cooked up within 5 to 10 minutes can make a quick meal. Some of these meals can be prepped just as quick as it might be to drive through a fast-food restaurant and get your meal and drive away. It can almost be the same amount of time if you plan ahead appropriately.

Natalie Salvatore, RN:

That sounds great. Thank you.

Julia Zumpano, RD:

One other thing I wanted to add, Natalie, is that there are a lot of great resources online that you can search for different recipes, different meal plans, meal ideas. Your local library has a lot of great cookbooks. Having those ahead, picking out the recipes for the week, being able to plan your grocery list and meal prep, that can really be helpful, especially if you make it a routine. So maybe you choose a day of the week where you pick your recipes, choose a day of the week where you go grocery shop and then a day of the week where you might meal prep. Planning ahead is really important. Back to that, tying into that fast food, 1 in 10 Americans believes that fast food is a part of a healthy diet, especially parents.

So, we really want to stress the importance of eating healthy for the whole family. We want to set up good eating habits for children and even young adults to where they can understand how to meal prep and how to help give them those tools at a young age and help set them up for success in the long term and really keeping in mind even healthy snacks. So being able to tie you over between meals when you are running around, having really good substantial snacks available to you, so that may even hold you over till you can make it home to make a better meal. So, some really good, portable, healthy snacks might be nuts or fresh fruit. Even unsweetened fruit cups would be fine, some Greek yogurt, a light cheese stick, some whole grain crackers. So those are some good examples, but there are so many more that we could really utilize to hold us over between meals and really keep us on the right track.

Natalie Salvatore, RN:

Thank you so much for all of that. It's been really great chatting with you. And thank you so much for providing an excellent overview of some of the key findings from our survey of the challenges that the community faces between cost, knowledge, time to prep and the availability of fast food and how easy it is to fall into that trap and even just the thoughts of that being part of a healthy diet.

Julia Zumpano, RD:

Thank you for having me and having this great topic presented to all our viewers and anyone who really wants to take their heart health in the next level and the next step.

Natalie Salvatore, RN:

One final thing to leave our listeners with. If they were interested in creating a change to move 2023 in a healthier direction for themselves, who should they reach out to?

Julia Zumpano, RD:

If you have a registered dietician available, that would be a great first step. If not, your primary care provider can help you find a certified nutritionist or registered dietician. You can ask your primary care provider or healthcare provider to really help you find resources towards what would be a good first step to making some dietary changes.

Natalie Salvatore, RN:

Great. Thank you so much, Julia.

Julia Zumpano, RD:

Thank you.

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