Strategies to prevent heart disease

Strategies to prevent heart disease

A healthy lifestyle contributes significantly to effective heart care. In particular, this includes sufficient physical activity and a healthy diet. In addition to these aspects of a healthy lifestyle, it can also make sense to suppress the outbreak of a heart disease with medication in some cases - for people at high risk for cardiovascular diseases - in the context of cardiovascular disease.

Every family doctor is required to determine the cardiovascular risk of his patients. Every patient should know their risk of developing cardiovascular disease. If necessary, he can discuss an individual risk reduction strategy with his doctor.

Heart care with physical activity

A metabolic equivalent (MET) corresponds approximately to the oxygen intake when sitting still (3.5 ml / kg / min). Athletes can easily increase their oxygen intake by 10 to 15 times and accordingly reach 10 - 15 MET. On the other hand, untrained people often stay at <8 MET.

Physical training that increases performance by 1 MET already leads to a 20% risk reduction in cardiovascular diseases. This effect is also observed in overweight people. Overweight people with good cardiovascular performance live longer than overweight people with poor performance.

The same applies to the causal risk factors. A diabetic can significantly reduce his cardiovascular risk through physical training. Of course, physical training also helps to reduce body weight and keep it in the desired area in the long term. The blood pressure values decrease. Also, physical exercise in people with low blood sugar levels is an extremely effective way to prevent the onset of overt blood sugar.

It's not about exhausting yourself to the point of exhaustion. Rather, the aim should be a load that is not too strong but even. Fast walking or careful jogging, cycling and swimming are good reasons to name just a few. This activity should be done 3-4 times a week for at least 30 minutes. For fast walking, 120-140 minutes per week are sufficient to noticeably increase performance and reduce the cardiovascular risk.

Healthy nutrition for heart prevention

A balanced, healthy diet has important positive effects on body weight, blood fat and blood sugar levels and, at least indirectly, even on blood pressure. Overall, there are some principles that make healthy eating easier. This includes that you can go crazy if it happens only occasionally and as part of an otherwise balanced diet.

On the other hand, there is certainly no contradiction between tasty and healthy. In many cases you will enjoy a fruit salad rather than a chocolate bar. But it takes a little more time.

Although the number of heart diseases has declined significantly in the past 10 years, which is partly due to the improved possibilities of medicine and technology, but also with prevention (including healthy eating, exercise), about 25% of all deaths are still present Attributed to heart disease. Improper nutrition plays an important role in heart diseases, e.g. found that the risk of heart disease is higher for people who eat a lot of saturated fat and little fresh fruit and vegetables.

Prevent atherosclerosis

In the case of diseases of the heart, there is usually arteriosclerosis (fatty arteries and hardening of the arteries), a vascular change that develops over a long period (20 - 30 years) and does not cause any symptoms at first.

                                        

                                      

Atherosclerosis development is accelerated by risk factors such as

Overweight,

Smoke,

Diabetes mellitus and

High blood pressure.

The best way to prevent arteriosclerosis is to eat a healthy, balanced diet. These include unsaturated fatty acids, i.e. especially vegetable fats and lots of fiber. Studies show that vegetarians are less at risk of cardiovascular disease than people who eat meat. Therefore, avoiding meat can reduce the formation of arteriosclerosis.

Physical exercise is also particularly important. Rather half an hour 3 times a week than 3 hours once a week.

Prevent elevated cholesterol

A distinction is made between cholesterol between HDL ("good" cholesterol) and LDL ("bad" cholesterol).

Cholesterol is found in all human and animal cells and is involved in cell building, the production of hormones, the formation of bile acids and the formation of vitamin D. And yet cholesterol plays a major role in the development of arteriosclerosis. High cholesterol levels are not only caused by improper nutrition, but are often also based on an interaction of behaviours (little exercise, wrong diet) and genetic dispositions. You can achieve a lot through a healthy diet.

It is very important to exclude or reduce the risk factors. I.e. Reduce obesity with a balanced, varied, low-calorie diet, stop smoking and properly treat diabetes and high blood pressure. Because reducing risk factors almost always lowers the high cholesterol level “on its own”.

With a reduction of 2mg / dl cholesterol, a risk reduction of 2% is achieved. Blood pressure drops by 2 mm / Hg per kilogram of weight reduction. So it is worth living healthy. If the cholesterol levels are too high in the long term, the cholesterol (mainly LDL) can accumulate on the arterial walls over time and eventually lead to a total occlusion of the artery. Heart attack! But you can prevent this in part with the help of a healthy diet.

What is the right diet?

50% of the daily energy, the basis of a healthy diet, should consist of carbohydrates: whole grains and whole grain products, bread, pasta, rice and potatoes are ideal.

15% of the daily energy should be covered by low-fat protein carriers such as fish, low-fat cheese (F.i.Tr. <30%), low-fat milk products (<1.5%) and low-fat sausage.

30% of your daily energy should consist of fat, but: Fat is not just fat. Saturated fatty acids, i.e. Animal fats, such as butter, lard, cream should be greatly reduced, as they negatively affect the cholesterol level (lower HDL, increase LDL).

The daily drinking amount should be between 1.5 and 2.0 litres, e.g. Mineral water, herbal and fruit teas.

The daily intake of cholesterol that is taken in through food should not exceed 300 mg, i.e. as little animal fat and food as possible. Vegetable fats are better, such as the monounsaturated fatty acids e.g. Olive oil and rapeseed oil (increase HDL, lower total cholesterol) and the polyunsaturated fatty acids such as sunflower oil, safflower oil, walnut oil (lower total cholesterol), which have a positive effect on cholesterol levels.

Even if our cholesterol level is positively influenced by oils, you should not use too much, since oils also contain many calories and, if consumed too often, promote excess weight.

How can a heart-healthy diet be designed?

·       As little animal fat as possible.

·       The highest possible proportion of vegetable fats.

·       Especially monounsaturated fatty acids (olive / rapeseed oil).

·       Less than 300 mg total cholesterol / day.

·       As much fiber as possible (> 30g / day).

·       Little sugar and sugary.

·       Salt little, rather use lots of herbs / spices.

·       Lots of fruit, vegetables and salad.

·       Drink a lot.

·       Take time to eat.

If you take these points into account in your daily diet, you have a varied, healthy and tasty diet that protects the heart and health and contributes to daily well-being.

Stop smoking

Smoking is extremely harmful to the body. This applies to both cardiovascular and cancer diseases. The risk of developing cardiovascular disease is 2 to 3 times higher on average for a smoker than for a non-smoker. The risk is even higher with heavy smoking. Cardiovascular diseases typically break out earlier in smokers.

Young people who suffer from cardiovascular diseases, especially women, are almost always smokers and would stay free of the disease for longer - perhaps lifelong - without smoking. If smoking is stopped, the cardiovascular risk decreases by 40-50%. Unfortunately, this often only happens when a heart attack or stroke with unavoidable damage has already occurred.

Smoking is not a pleasure, but an addiction. Unfortunately, many children and adolescents still use cigarettes, so that their vascular system is exposed to severe stress very early on. Blood clots develop and the blood vessels age prematurely. They become susceptible to diseases and tend to calcify.