November 5 (HealthDay News) -- Keep eating whole grains and reduce your consumption of eggs and high-fat dairy food to improve your odds against suffering heart failure, a new long-term study shows.

The study, which looked at more than 14,000 people over 13 years, found that participants had a 7 percent lower risk of heart failure (HF) per one-serving increase in whole grain consumption. The risk increased by 8 percent per one-serving increase in high-fat dairy intake and by 23 percent per one-serving increase in egg consumption. Other food groups did not appear to directly affect risk of heart failure.

The findings were published in the November issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association.

"The totality of literature in this area suggests it would be prudent to recommend that those at high risk of HF increase their intake of whole grains and reduce intake of high-fat dairy and eggs, along with following other healthful dietary practices consistent with those recommended by the American Heart Association," article co-author Jennifer A. Nettleton, an assistant professor in the Division of Epidemiology and Disease Control at the University of Texas Health Sciences Center at Houston, said in an association news release.

SOURCE: American Dietetic Association, news release, Oct. 27, 2008