Is Intermittent Fasting For You?
Heart Health
Did you know that heart disease is the leading cause of death for both men and women in the United States? The good news? It is also one of the most preventable diseases if you start making heart-healthy lifestyle choices, know your family health history and the risk factors for heart disease, have regular check-ups and work with your physician to manage the integral aspects of saving lives from this often-silent killer. (1)
How can YOU make a difference for yourself? It starts with one step at a time.
The Wakeup Call
Getting diagnosed with health problems like high blood pressure or high cholesterol means it is time to make some major lifestyle changes. And if you have not gotten that wake-up call, there are a few simple lifestyle changes to make that can help you avoid such a diagnosis in the first place. Here are some important heart health steps:
- Maintain Healthy Weight
Research shows that just by losing 5 to 10 percent of your body weight, you can reduce the risk of heart attack and stroke. Get started on a plan to cut unnecessary calories to help you reap the heart health benefits of gradual weight loss and then a maintenance plan to keep it off. (2)
- Eat Better
Work heart healthy foods into your diet like fish high in omega-3s, such as salmon, tuna, mackerel, herring and trout, berries (blueberries, strawberries, cranberries, and raspberries), oatmeal, red, yellow, and orange veggies such as carrots, sweet potatoes, red peppers and acorn squash, fruits including oranges, cantaloupe, and papaya and even some dark chocolate. (3)
- Get Active
Walking is easy, costs nothing and doing it for as few as 30 minutes a day is one of the most effective forms of exercise to achieve heart health. If you can, schedule your active time on your calendar just as you would an appointment, so you’re more likely to stick to it. It also helps to get an activity tracker that can help motivate you to walk ten thousand steps a day. (4)
- Manage Blood Pressure
One way to do that is trying for even a small reduction in the sodium in your diet to less than 2,300 milligrams (mg). Keep track by eating fewer processed foods, taste your food before adding any salt, and instead of adding salt to everything try using herbs and spices to flavor foods.
- Reduce Blood Sugar
Getting too much added sugar in your diet could significantly increase your risk of dying from cardiovascular disease and contribute to obesity and high blood pressure. Your body doesn’t need any added sugar—it gets all it needs from the sugar that naturally occurs in food. Sugary food and refined carbs just add up to a lot of empty calories that are as bad for your heart as they are for your waistline. If you still have that sweet tooth that needs attention, try eating a handful of berries, or another piece of fruit like an apple or orange instead.
- Stop Smoking
There are immediate and long-term health benefits of quitting for all smokers. Within a year, beneficial changes can include heart rate and blood pressure drop, carbon monoxide level in your blood drops to normal, circulation improves and lung function increases, coughing and shortness of breath decrease, and the risk of coronary heart disease is about half that of a smoker’s. We know quitting is a lot easier than it sounds. Write down a plan for weening yourself off of smoking and choose a quit date, find social support through your loved ones or support groups who have experienced your challenges to quitting as well, incorporate ways for you to relax, like listening to music, exercising, avoiding stressful situations, and make time for yourself to do things you love to do.
- Get Quality Sleep
Sleep provides time for your body to restore and recharge and not getting enough or getting fragmented sleep can heighten your risk of not just heart attacks or stroke, but also high blood pressure, high cholesterol, obesity, and diabetes. How much sleep do you need? Aim for at least seven hours every night. It helps to go to bed and wake up at the same time every day, stay off of electronic devices 2-3 hours before bedtime and avoid caffeine, alcohol, and large meals before hitting the pillow. (5)
Making positive changes in any one of these areas can have influence in your health, and more and more research shows the results are much more dramatic when you apply all the factors, so they work together.
Small changes really do matter and making them before you develop a chronic condition is best.
References:
- https://www.cdc.gov/heartdisease/facts.htm
- https://www.webmd.com/heart-disease/news/20110214/obesity-increases-risk-of-deadly-heart-attacks
- https://www.nhlbi.nih.gov/news/2020/study-following-variety-healthy-eating-patterns-may-help-lower-your-risk-heart-disease
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3098122/
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/labs/pmc/articles/PMC2845795/
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