Why Heart Health is Important: Emergency Room Near You
Our hearts work for us every second of every day, nonstop even when we are asleep without any rest at all. On average, over the course of the average lifetime, the heart may beat for over 2 billion times which just goes to highlight how much work it actually puts in for us. It is one of the body’s vital organs when it comes to keeping us alive without any doubt and any issues with it is definitely something that should be taken very seriously. Heart disease, as is to be expected, is one of the leading causes of death out there affecting many Americans every year with the stats showing that someone in the country has a coronary event every 25 seconds. It actually claims about a million lives a year which goes to show just how prolific it is as a cause of death among the men and women of America. While it is true that there are certain risk factors that you may not have the power over such as family history, age or sex, there are still a number of things that you can do to ensure your heart health. This article will look to highlight why heart health is important as well as what you can do to ensure that you keep your heart healthy.
Heart health is important since, as mentioned above, heart disease is the leading cause of death among men and women in the country, claiming upwards of 1 million lives each year. This statistic is definitely eye-opening and should be enough to convince you why you should try and ensure that your heart is in good health. Heart health is also not a matter of age and it is something that you should be on top off regardless of your age. Most of the time people assume that due to the fact that they are young, then they have a strong and healthy heart by default and they have years ahead of them before heart disease becomes something they should worry about. This is not the case as there are a number of cases where we see young people being struck by heart disease and as such it shows that it is important to have your heart health in mind regardless of your age. It is important to know the role our lifestyle, especially when it comes to the food we eat, our fitness levels and so forth, plays when it comes to the health of our heart so that we can know what to do to ensure a healthy heart.
It is important to know what you can do to be able to keep your heart healthy and as such avoid heart disease and this is what we are going to look at next. One of the things you should do is to watch your diet and ensure that you maintain a diet that is heart-healthy. This means that you should incorporate more fruits, vegetables and whole grains to your diet as these are known to be good for your heart health. You should avoid taking too much sugars and salts in your diet as well as trying also to avoid consuming trans fats and saturated fats. The aim should be to keep your saturated fat at about 5 to 7 percent of your daily calories. The major sources of trans fats and saturated fats are red meat, full-fat dairy products, margarines, chips, cookies, bakery products among others and you should cut back on these. If you have to eat meat, eat lean meats.
You should also quit smoking or the use of tobacco as this is one of the most significant risk factors as far as developing heart disease is concerned. If you quit smoking, your risk of heart disease will be sliced in half after one year and it will continue going down as long as you keep away from smoking so quit smoking and begin to reap the rewards. The next thing you should look to do is to exercise more and regularly. This can help you control your weight as well as helping keeping your cholesterol levels down as the activities during exercise will help burn cholesterol. You should try and work out at least 30 minutes a day, with experts recommending that you should set aside about 150 minutes each week for moderate aerobic activity such as walking the dog, taking the stairs rather than the lift among others. You should also ensure that you keep your weight down at a healthy level to lower your risk of heart disease. Other things to do include ensuring you get enough quality sleep as a lack of this increases one’s risk of obesity, high blood pressure among other things, you should also keep your stress under control, get regular heart screenings which will help you know crucial numbers such as those on your blood pressure, cholesterol and diabetes which will then allow you to take any necessary action.
It is important to know the importance of heart health as well as the actions you can take to ensure that you keep your heart healthy and to that extent, we hope this article will be of great help. Remember, if you are experiencing symptoms that may indicate a heart attack or any issue with your heart such as chest pain, difficulties breathing among others, then you should head over to an emergency room near you as soon as possible.
