High homocysteine levels are associated with increased risk for coronary heart disease and stroke, but you can easily prevent that.

Homocysteine is an amino acid, which can build up in your body and cause problems if you are deficient in folic acid, vitamin B-12, and vitamin B6. The study reviewed here followed 2009 participants for an average of 11.95 years documenting homocysteine levels and how it affected the risk of coronary heart disease and stroke (Sun Y., et al, 2009). The results showed that participants with blood levels of homocysteine above 9.47 micromole/L had a 2.3-fold risk for cardiovascular events and participants with homocysteine levels above 11.84 micromole/L had a 2.4-fold risk for death. Taking a good vitamin B-Complex regularly will in most people reduce homocysteine levels. There are some people who do not metabolize folic acid properly and would not get the same benefits from regular folic acid. They could however take a vitamin B-Complex, which also contains the metabolism of folic acid and get the benefits. To read more about the benefits of B-vitamins, click here.

Use of serum homocysteine to predict stroke, coronary heart disease and death in ethnic Chinese. 12-year prospective cohort study. Sun Y., Chien KL, Hsu HC, Su TC, Chen MF, Lee YT. Circ J. 2009 Aug;73(8):1423-30. Epub 2009 Jun 11.