A new research has revealed that fat neck may also be used as a measure to determine heart risk. It’s likely to asses anyone’s waist as a clue for ascertaining the risk of heart problems.

The researchers said, with the help of measuring the thickness of one’s neck may be used as clues to evaluate the risk of heart disease in even those with comparatively trim waistlines. Phenomenon of the risk was defined as to have lower levels of healthy cholesterol or blood glucose with higher levels. High density lipoprotein (HDL)-good cholesterol is known to take away cholesterol from the cells to the liver where it is broken down. If men and women have a lower ratio of (HDL) than it is recommended, they have a greater tendency to develop heart diseases.

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Sleeping an hour longer daily may lead to a lower chance of the accumulation of calcium plaques in coronary artery tracts, predicting possible heart disease, said a study published in the December 24 issue of Journal of American Medical Association. The researchers report that one additional hour of sleep per night lowered the estimated odds of calcification by 33%.

Christopher Ryan King, B.S. (University of Chicago) and his team started this study in 2001 with 495 individuals( black and white people between the ages 35 and 47) to test if a scientifically measured sleep duration was linked to the development of calcification over a 5 year period.

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According to a new study, lack of a vitamin D that is received through sunlight can increase the risk of strokes and heart attacks.

Dr. James H. O’Keefe, who led the study, says in this connection: “There are many studies that show link between vitamin D deficiency and higher risk of cardiovascular diseases.”

“Usually risk of high blood pressure, left ventricle stiffening and diabetes are related to vitamin D deficiency. People deficient in vitamin D have higher ratio of inflammation and inflammation is considered quite important for heart disease.”

According to some experts, almost 30% children and teens, and half of adults in the US suffer from vitamin D deficiency.

Data from the Framingham Heart Study shows that people with below 15nanograms/ml blood have two times more risk of having a heart attack or some other cardiovascular disease.

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According to the US researchers, the lack of sunshine during winter may cause diminishing vitamin D levels in the body and lead to heart woes.

Sunshine is needed to the body to produce vitamin D, due to less daylight and spending more time indoors in winter can slowdown this process.

Study author Sue Penckofer, who is a professor at the Marcella Niehoff School of Nursing at Loyola University in Chicago, says in a university news release: “Chronic vitamin D deficiency may become the cause of high blood pressure, heart disease and metabolic syndrome.”

In their study, Sue and team reviewed many such studies that associated heart disease to vitamin D deficiency. According to these studies, severe heart disease or heart death rates are 30 to 50 percent higher in the patients with sun-deprived heart diseases.

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Soon after the two studies that discounted the helpfulness of vitamin B, folic acid, vitamin D and calcium supplements for cancer prevention, now U.S researchers report that even vitamin C and E supplements are not helpful to avoid cancer.

The same researchers have recently reported that vitamin C and E supplements are not beneficial to prevent even heart disease.

Dr. Howard Sesso (one of the study’s authors), who is an assistant professor of medicine in the division of preventive medicine at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, says: “We find no compelling evidence to take vitamin E or C at least in the context of two very common outcomes i.e. cardioprotection and chemoprevention.”

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