Being fat may help your heart

Being fat may protect people from cardiovascular mortality -  in short your heart is what researchers have claimed.

High body mass index (BMI) is associated with multiple cardiovascular diseases. However, emerging data suggest that there is an "obesity paradox" - that being overweight may actually protect patients from cardiovascular mortality.
Investigators have confirmed that the risk of total mortality, cardiovascular mortality, and myocardial infarction is highest among underweight patients, while cardiovascular mortality is lowest among overweight patients, according to two reports published in the journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings.
Abhishek Sharma, Cardiology Fellow at the State University of New York Downstate Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York, and colleagues conducted a meta-analysis of 36 studies. They determined that low BMI (less than 20 kg/m2) in tens of thousands of patients with coronary artery disease who underwent coronary revascularisation procedures was associated with a 1.8- to 2.7-fold higher risk of myocardial infarction and all-cause and cardiovascular mortality over a mean follow up period of 1.7 years.

One explanation may be that overweight patients are more likely to be prescribed cardioprotective medications such as beta blockers and statins and in higher doses than the normal weight population.