Small changes can prevent heart disease­

Heart dis­ease is the num­ber one killer of men and women, respon­si­ble for about one-fourth of all deaths in the United States each year, and a major cause of disability.

Dur­ing Heart Health month in Feb­ru­ary, we like to take the time to remind peo­ple that small changes in diet, lifestyle and other habits can have a big impact on heart disease.

Heart dis­ease deaths have fallen 28 per­cent in recent years; the Amer­i­can Heart Asso­ci­a­tion attrib­utes much of the decline to changes in risk fac­tors such as smok­ing and cho­les­terol lev­els and advances in treat­ment options.

Your heart dis­ease risk fac­tors are con­di­tions, behav­iors and other fac­tors such as fam­ily his­tory that raise your risk of heart dis­ease and heart attack. If you already have a heart dis­ease diag­no­sis, they increase the chance that your con­di­tion will worsen.

The more risk fac­tors you have, the greater your chances of hav­ing heart dis­ease or a heart attack. While there is noth­ing we can do about our age, gen­der and fam­ily his­tory, we can con­trol many other risk factors.

What can you do? Your first step to pre­vent heart dis­ease is mak­ing healthy lifestyle choices. Here are six that can dra­mat­i­cally reduce your risk.

Eat a healthy diet: It should include plenty of fruits and veg­eta­bles, foods low in sat­u­rated fat and cho­les­terol, and foods high in fiber. You should also limit your sodium intake.

Main­tain a healthy weight: You can visit our web­site (ohiohealth.com/calculatebmi) to cal­cu­late your Body Mass Index (BMI) that deter­mines a health weight range. Abdom­i­nal fat recently has been iden­ti­fied as an inde­pen­dent risk factor.

Exer­cise: The Sur­geon Gen­eral rec­om­mends 30 min­utes of mod­er­ate inten­sity on most days dur­ing the week.

Stop smok­ing: The Amer­i­can Heart Asso­ci­a­tion iden­ti­fies cig­a­rette smok­ing as the most impor­tant cause of pre­ventable death in the United States.

Limit alco­hol con­sump­tion: While research has shown that one or two drinks a day has a pro­tec­tive ben­e­fit, drink­ing too much increases blood pressure.

Have reg­u­lar check­ups: You should have your cho­les­terol checked once every five years, and your blood pres­sure checked reg­u­larly. If you have dia­betes, it is impor­tant to keep your blood sugar lev­els under con­trol. No mat­ter what your con­di­tion, always take any med­ica­tion as prescribed.

Block­ages from the buildup of fat and cho­les­terol deposits in the coro­nary arter­ies cause a heart attack. Warn­ing signs include pain/discomfort in the chest, or in other areas of the body such as one or both arms, neck, jaw or stomach.

Stud­ies have shown that women hav­ing heart attacks are less likely to present chest pain/discomfort — the hall­mark symp­tom in men — and more likely to expe­ri­ence other com­mon symp­toms such as short­ness of breath, weak­ness, unusual fatigue, nau­sea, vom­it­ing and pain/discomfort in the neck, jaw or stomach.

In cel­e­bra­tion of Heart Health month, Ohio­Health has cre­ated a Face­book appli­ca­tion called “Heart­beats to Health” that enables you to earn cred­its for heart healthy activ­i­ties. For every heart healthy choice you record on the page, Ohio­Health will donate $1 up to $10,000 to the Amer­i­can Heart Asso­ci­a­tion. Start now by vis­it­ing OhioHealth.com/heartbeats to learn more about what you can do to improve your heart health and par­tic­i­pate in the Face­book program.

Dr. Abra­ham C. Parail is a board-certified inter­ven­tional car­di­ol­o­gist with Heart­Care and an active mem­ber of the Grady Memo­r­ial Hos­pi­tal med­ical staff. Ohio­Health is a proud local spon­sor of Amer­i­can Heart Asso­ci­a­tion Go Red for Women.

Posted by Grady Memorial Hospital on Feb 8 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Comments can be made below.