Heart problems, some alcohol and coffee to have less. Here are the foods to reduce to avoid atrial fibrillation

Although the treatment of atrial fibrillation, both pharmacological and instrumental, has progressed in recent years, the treatment of this pathology remains a major challenge. In addition to current therapy, control of risk factors is essential, especially modifiable ones such as diabetes, obesity or hypertension that are largely dependent on diet. So food is very important in controlling this arrhythmia which, remember, is usually in people of advanced age.

LEADERS

In a recent issue of the European Heart Journal, Monika Gawalko and Dominik Linz from the Department of Cardiology at Maastricht University (The Netherlands) published a review on “Diet and risk of atrial fibrillation”. Paying attention to different parts of our diet and assessing their potential to promote atrial fibrillation.

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For this reason, all articles published on the subject between 2000 and 2024 and present on the Pub-Med platform were analyzed. As for the most famous diets (from the Mediterranean to the EAT-Lancet diet which is characterized by a high consumption of vegetables and a moderate consumption of fish, meat and legumes) they seem to be associated with a reduction in danger. There is also evidence that there is an increased risk of arrhythmia in those who eat a lot of ultra-processed foods.
Several individual components of the diet were also analyzed, and here we will deal with the most common ones associated with arrhythmic pathologies. In the case of alcohol, it has been clearly demonstrated that there is a dose-dependent relationship between alcohol consumption and atrial fibrillation. The more you eat, the worse it gets.

APOSTOLIC

And several studies on the subject have shown that even a small amount of alcohol increases the risk of arrhythmia, especially in men and beer drinkers. The ARIC study then identified a 13% increase in arrhythmic risk even in former alcohol users.
For caffeine and drinks containing it, there is no clear evidence of its important role in the development of fibrillation. However, several studies on the subject provide conflicting results. In some, a U-shaped risk curve has been identified, with the lowest risk in those who consume 4 coffees a day and the highest risk in those who drink more or even less. Other studies, however, talk about an increase in risk of around 50% in users of more than 3 cups a day and finally other research does not document the effect of coffee on arrhythmic risk.
Studies on the effects of chocolate have not identified any arrhythmic risk. On the other hand, the most important prospective study (“Danish Diet cancer and health study”) showed a reduction in the risk of fibrillation between 10% and 20% in regular users.