"If individuals want to do something that's good for their heart, then my message to them is lose weight by the method they find most tolerable," says the study's senior author Sándor J. Kovács, Ph.D, M.D., director of Washington University's Cardiovascular Biophysics Laboratory. "They're virtually guaranteed that it will have a salutary effect on their cardiovascular system."And the heart is not picky − it responds to weight loss whether it comes from eating less or exercising more.