Preventing heart disease
Preventing heart disease
We all take steps to avoid things we don’t like. We are careful when crossing a road, we try to avoid catching a cold, take precautions to stop getting sun burn, getting dehydrated and many more. So you might think that something as important as preventing heart disease would be one of these unpleasant things to avoid. Not dying earlier than necessary should be one of our priorities but preventing heart disease is rarely thought about and when it is considered it is maybe too late anyway.
Some of us would need something unusual to happen to make us think about preventing heart disease for ourselves.
- This might be a relative having a stroke or heart attack or similar.
- Maybe this happens to a friend of about the same age as ourselves.
- Maybe we have a routine blood pressure or cholesterol check up and we our suprised by the results.
- We finally believe the endless advice to stop smoking or shed a few pounds.
Whatever the stimulus for making us think then is the time to take action. If you wait for the symptoms to hit you then sorry its too late to think about preventing heart disease and to start worrying about dealing with heart disease.
OK so hopefully we have got your interest in this important, life changing and possibly prolonging subject and you are ready to be selfish and start thinking about yourself.
What you need to do is to get started is to find what position you are in now in what you can do to make it better. Sure if you stop smoking or reduce your weight or take exercise these will all make a difference but how much of a difference and are there other more important things to consider also.
We need to get a bit technical here and consider your heart disease risk factors which include these main groupings:
- You
- Are you male or female
- How old are you
- What is your blood pressure
- How is your cholesterol
- Family history
- Do you have a relative whose first sign of heart disease was at an early age
- How close is this family member to you
- How many relatives are like this
- Lifestyle
- Are you overweight
- Do you smoke
- How good is your diet
- Do you use cocaine or steroids
- Do you drink too much
- Are you stressed
- Health conditions
- Do you have diabetes
- Do you have dyslipidemia
Once you know your risk factors and which are the more important and how they add up to make your heart disease risk score then you can see what can be done to get your score down and lower your risk which is the principal of preventing heart disease.
Like most things in life the benefits are in the details and nothing comes easy so you will have to do a little research and make a small effort to get the results. Ultimately you may need medical help to lower your risk but there is a lot you can do before you get to that point even if it becomes necessary.
Get started with the MyHeartRisk personal heart disease risk assessment where you first record your data and let the program assess where you are now on the heart disease risk scale. You get instructions and the time to enter data about yourself and your family members. You get back the following to help both yourself and to show to your doctor:
Heart disease is the leading cause of death and preventing heart disease or at least avoiding it for as long as possible is worth starting today.
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This is part of the MyHeartRisk (My Heart Risk) series on how to prevent heart disease including:
- Family history of heart disease
- Family heart disease
- How is your heart like your car?
- My heart risk score
- Your heart disease risk calculator and report writer
- Heart attack risk
- BMI and heart disease
MyHeartRisk mission: To help users better understand their personal heart disease risk factors and how to advocate for themselves with their health care providers for a more healthy and potentially longer life. To ask the question ‘What is my heart risk’ and get not only a personalized response but to have a partner on the road to improved health and longevity.
Join our MyHeartRisk online family by taking our newsletter then we can keep you informed and to get you started you will receive a free ebook
‘Preventing your heart disease’
We hope you will take this self help program and the opportunity to start preventing heart disease.
