Taking Care of Your Heart: Everyday Habits That Can Help
Taking care of your heart is a very good idea. As well as helping protect you from deadly heart disease, heart care boosts your all-round health and quality of life.
About Heart Disease and Heart Attacks
Every day, hundreds of Australians suffer from heart attacks. Those who are lucky enough to recover often suffer another (and often fatal) heart attack later on.
Seek emergency help immediately if you have chest pressure or pain, pain spreading to the arm, jaw, neck, or back, sudden shortness of breath, faintness, cold sweats, or sudden nausea. Call emergency services right away.
Heart disease — the number 1 cause of death in Australia — kills more than twice as many people as any form of cancer. The good news is that heart disease is largely preventable, and taking steps to minimise your risk can add 10 years to your life.
The heart is an amazing muscle. This powerful pump is responsible for delivering blood (which carries oxygen and nutrients) to all parts of the body. Most of us take our hearts for granted — until we experience a problem.
A stroke, heart attack or even a diagnosis of high blood pressure can cause you to take notice of your heart health. But cardiovascular fitness doesn’t just happen. How you treat your heart will determine how long and how well it will continue to work for you.
How to Prevent Heart Disease
Some risk factors are beyond your control; for example, heredity (heart disease tends to run in families) and age (most deaths from heart disease occur in people over age 65). But there are lifestyle factors you can control that may help prevent, or at least postpone, heart disease.
A. Diet
You really are what you eat. Diets built around highly processed foods and refined carbohydrates can contribute to weight gain and elevated blood sugar, which are linked with heart disease risk.
If a blockage occurs in an artery that carries blood to the heart, it causes a heart attack. If a blockage occurs in an artery that carries blood to the brain, it causes a stroke. A heart-healthy diet helps support normal cholesterol levels, blood pressure, and metabolic health.
Commonly suggested approaches include:
- Limiting ultra-processed foods such as packaged snacks, takeaway meals, sugary drinks, confectionery and refined grain products.
- Reducing added sugars and refined carbohydrates (white bread, pastries, sweetened cereals, and desserts).
- Choosing whole foods more often: meats, vegetables, fruits, legumes, nuts, eggs, dairy.
- Including sources of healthy fats such as fish, olive oil, avocado and nuts.
- Preferring whole grains (oats, barley, brown rice) instead of refined grains.
- Cooking by baking, grilling, steaming or sautéing rather than deep frying.
- Moderating portion sizes and avoiding habitual overeating.
- If alcohol is consumed, doing so in moderation.
B. Maintain a Healthy Body Weight
The best way to do this is to make sure the calories you consume do not exceed the calories you burn. Being overweight increases your risk of heart disease because excess body weight forces your heart to work harder and less efficiently.
To make “calories you burn” more concrete, it helps to anchor it to a simple everyday activity. A steady walk is a useful baseline, and you can estimate calories per mile for your weight as a quick reference point.
If you’re overweight, losing 5-10 percent of your body weight can significantly reduce your risk of heart disease. Gradual weight reduction of up to a kg per week is often discussed in general health advice.
C. Get Moving
Regular exercise is associated with heart health. Exercise helps control cholesterol levels and body weight, and is linked with healthier blood pressure. And because your heart is a muscle, it responds to physical activity like other muscles in your body.
Public-health guidance commonly refers to aerobic exercise (brisk walking, jogging, swimming, cycling) performed regularly during the week. Even without a structured routine, everyday activities can contribute to overall movement:
- Taking the stairs instead of the elevator.
- Parking at the far end of the parking lot when going to the mall.
- Doing housework or yard work at a quicker pace and more often (like hoeing the garden, or vacuuming every day).
- If you want an energy use comparison, see our leaf blower vs rake calorie estimate for a common yard-work example.
- Getting out of a chair regularly to avoid being sedentary for long periods.
D. Don’t Smoke
Smokers are up to three times more likely to have a heart attack than non-smokers. Nicotine injures the lining of blood vessels and increases the build-up of fatty deposits, which can lead to heart disease. Exposure to other people’s smoke (second-hand smoke) can also increase your risk.
E. Reduce Stress
Stress can adversely affect your heart health. It can raise your blood pressure and injure the arteries due to increased blood flow during the stress response. Relaxation techniques such as yoga, meditation and massage are often discussed as ways people manage stress.
F. Nutritional Supplements
Supplements are not a substitute for heart-healthy eating, activity, and medical care, and they can interact with medicines. If you are considering vitamins or supplements for heart prevention, review Heart Foundation advice and speak with your GP or pharmacist.
Some supplements have been studied for heart health, but findings are inconsistent and benefits vary between individuals. Antioxidant vitamins (A, C and E) are involved in normal body processes, yet routine supplementation has not consistently shown added protection against heart disease in population studies.
Products such as garlic, ginkgo biloba, Co-Q10, Pycnogenol, grape seed extract and soy protein are sometimes discussed in relation to cardiovascular health. However, research results are mixed, and these products should be viewed as optional dietary additions rather than reliable methods of preventing heart disease.
G. Omega 3 Fatty Acids
In the late 1970’s a group of scientists did a study on Greenland Eskimos because they have a very low rate of heart disease. The were surprised to find that these Eskimos actually ate a fairly high fat diet, with approximately 39% of their caloric intake from fat!
Further analysis revealed their intake of saturated fat to be low, whereas their dietary intake of Omega 3 Fatty Acids was high.
These findings contrasted sharply with the dietary habits of an ethnically similar population in Denmark, with much higher rates of heart disease. The Danish diet had a comparable amount of fat (42% of total energy), but a much lower intake of polyunsaturated fat vs saturated fat.
A second similar study followed inhabitants of Greenland and Denmark for 25 years. A 10-fold increase in heart attacks was noted in the Denmark group!
A couple of other studies dramatically show the benefits of Omega-3PUFA. The first study was done on men, ages 40-84 years of age, who were free of heart disease. These men were asked to complete food questionnaires on fish consumption, and were followed for 11 years. The results showed that consuming at least one fish meal per week reduced the risk of Cardiac Sudden Death by 52% compared to those consuming fish only monthly!
The previously mentioned study involved Omega-3PUFA derived from fish sources. A study of Omega-3PUFA from plant sources was done on 76,283 women, aged 30-55, who were free of heart disease at the onset of the study. The results showed the higher the intake of Omega-3PUFA, the lower the mortality rate from heart disease.
Interestingly, women who consumed oil and vinegar salad dressing were at a much lower risk of fatal heart attacks. These salad dressings typically are made with unhydrogenated soy bean oil, which contains about 7% Omega-3PUFA.
The best fish sources of Omega-3PUFA are: salmon, mackerel, herring and tuna.
The best plant sources of Omega-3PUFA are: flax seed oil (by far, the richest in W-3PUFA), butternuts, walnuts, soybeans.
The best oil sources of Omega-3PUFA are flaxseed, soybean and canola.
Some people choose Omega-3 fatty acid supplements when their diet contains few of these foods.