| "April 25, 2007 -- Just one trip through the drive-through for a fatty, fast-food meal could put your heart at risk." "A new study shows eating a fatty meal heightens the unhealthy effects of stress on the heart, like raising blood pressure." "Researchers found that people who ate a fatty, fast-food breakfast were more prone to suffer the negative effects of stress than those who ate a healthy, low-fat breakfast." ""What's really shocking is that this is just one meal," says researcher Tavis Campbell, PhD, assistant professor of psychology at the University of Calgary, in a news release. "It's been well documented that a high-fat diet leads to atherosclerosis [hardening of the arteries] and high blood pressure, and that exaggerated and prolonged cardiovascular responses to stress are associated with high blood pressure in the future."" ""So when we learn that even a single, high-fat meal can make you more reactive to stress, it's cause for concern because it suggests a new and damaging way that a high-fat diet affects cardiovascular function."" "In the study, 30 healthy adults fasted the night before and then ate either a high-fat breakfast from McDonald's consisting of a sausage McMuffin, an egg McMuffin, and two hash brown patties or a low-fat breakfast of dry cereal with skim milk, a cereal fruit bar, fat-free yogurt, and a glass of orange juice." "Both meals contained about 800
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