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World Heart Day: Time To Know Your Health Scale

Increase Awareness to Prevent Heart Disease

Do you know how healthy your heart is? In this modern world, people rarely have time to concentrate on their health. Obesity, unhealthy diet, high blood pressure, cholesterol, bad sugar levels and lack of exercise are some of the main causes for heart disease. Since World Heart Day is fast approaching, it is high time to make changes to our lifestyle and educate people about heart disease and ways to prevent it. Here are some easy and simple ways to do that:

Quit Smoking

In the United States, almost one in every five people die each year because of smoking. The chemicals in tobacco smoke not only damage blood cells, but also weaken the function of your heart and blood vessels. If you are a smoker, the best thing to do is to quit right away.

Physical Activity

Keep your body fit by doing regular exercise. Simple physical activities such as walking, running or swimming increase skeletal muscle strength. This also helps reduce blood pressure and cholesterol levels to prevent heart disease. Make it a habit and spare at least 30 minutes of your day.

Avoid Obesity

Nearly 70% of all Americans are overweight. This leads to developing health problems such as heart disease, stroke, high blood pressure, diabetes and more. Hence it is a must to maintain a healthy weight. You should check with a BMI calculator at least once a year. If you are overweight, take precautionary measures like eating fewer calories than your body needs and doing aerobic exercise for 30 minutes daily.

Healthy Food Habits

Take plenty of fibrous foods such as whole-grain cereals, potatoes, and bran to help you lower the risk of heart disease. Avoid fat products. Eat more of fruits and vegetables – they are a good source of fibers, vitamins and minerals. Reduce salt as much as possible in your foods to maintain your blood pressure and sugar level under control. Include fish in your meals at least twice a week. While shopping, keep track of the calories mentioned on the food and drink labels. It is always good to know how much fat, salt and sugar the product contains. This will help you choose a diet with less calories.

Avoid Alcohol

Alcohol contains more calories. Drinking regularly and over a long period of time, can increase your blood pressure which is the main cause of heart disease. It also weakens the heart muscle, and this can lead to heart failure.

Periodical Heart Check-ups

It is important to do periodical heart check-ups like ECG and Echo tests even if you do not have health problems.

Organize Awareness Campaigns

September 29th is an important day for raising heart-health awareness. Many health organizations host events across the country to create awareness and to prevent heart disease.

You can also host campaigns in your local community and ask health care professionals, dietician and the general public participate. Arrange a group discussion where people can share their views about heart disea

Increase Awareness to Prevent Heart Disease

Do you know how healthy your heart is? In this modern world, people rarely have time to concentrate on their health. Obesity, unhealthy diet, high blood pressure, cholesterol, bad sugar levels and lack of exercise are some of the main causes for heart disease. Since World Heart Day is fast approaching, it is high time to make changes to our lifestyle and educate people about heart disease and ways to prevent it. Here are some easy and simple ways to do that:

Quit Smoking

In the United States, almost one in every five people die each year because of smoking. The chemicals in tobacco smoke not only damage blood cells, but also weaken the function of your heart and blood vessels. If you are a smoker, the best thing to do is to quit right away.

Physical Activity

Keep your body fit by doing regular exercise. Simple physical activities such as walking, running or swimming increase skeletal muscle strength. This also helps reduce blood pressure and cholesterol levels to prevent heart disease. Make it a habit and spare at least 30 minutes of your day.

Avoid Obesity

Nearly 70% of all Americans are overweight. This leads to developing health problems such as heart disease, stroke, high blood pressure, diabetes and more. Hence it is a must to maintain a healthy weight. You should check with a BMI calculator at least once a year. If you are overweight, take precautionary measures like eating fewer calories than your body needs and doing aerobic exercise for 30 minutes daily.

Healthy Food Habits

Take plenty of fibrous foods such as whole-grain cereals, potatoes, and bran to help you lower the risk of heart disease. Avoid fat products. Eat more of fruits and vegetables – they are a good source of fibers, vitamins and minerals. Reduce salt as much as possible in your foods to maintain your blood pressure and sugar level under control. Include fish in your meals at least twice a week. While shopping, keep track of the calories mentioned on the food and drink labels. It is always good to know how much fat, salt and sugar the product contains. This will help you choose a diet with less calories.

Avoid Alcohol

Alcohol contains more calories. Drinking regularly and over a long period of time, can increase your blood pressure which is the main cause of heart disease. It also weakens the heart muscle, and this can lead to heart failure.

Periodical Heart Check-ups

It is important to do periodical heart check-ups like ECG and Echo tests even if you do not have health problems.

Organize Awareness Campaigns

September 29th is an important day for raising heart-health awareness. Many health organizations host events across the country to create awareness and to prevent heart disease.

You can also host campaigns in your local community and ask health care professionals, dietician and the general public participate. Arrange a group discussion where people can share their views about heart diseases, preventive measures that need to be adopted and the necessity to change unhealthy lifestyle. You can surprise the participants with cool and exciting gifts. Because they are quite popular and versatile, you can go with customized silicone wristbands. These products are trendy, cost-effective, fashionable and easily customizable. You can get them online and choose from a variety of types, colors, fonts, sizes and styles. Customizing your wristbands with messages like “Follow Healthy Habits” or “Do Regular Heart Check-ups” is a useful option to promote public awareness.

Article Source: http://EzineArticles.com/9530995

ses, preventive measures that need to be adopted and the necessity to change unhealthy lifestyle. You can surprise the participants with cool and exciting gifts. Because they are quite popular and versatile, you can go with customized silicone wristbands. These products are trendy, cost-effective, fashionable and easily customizable. You can get them online and choose from a variety of types, colors, fonts, sizes and styles. Customizing your wristbands with messages like “Follow Healthy Habits” or “Do Regular Heart Check-ups” is a useful option to promote public awareness.

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What Triggers a Heart Attack?

THE FOLLOWING RISK FACTORS MAY TRIGGER A HEART ATTACK:

  • Smoking: Did you know that nicotine and carbon monoxide put a lot of stress on the heart by forcing it to work faster? This, in turn, accelerates the risk of blood clots. Besides, the presence of different chemicals in the smoke injures the lining of your coronary arteries. It is estimated that smoking can enhance heart risk by 24 percent.
  • High blood pressure: Hypertension tends to deteriorate the coronary arteries, thus making them absolutely vulnerable to coronary heart disease. Hence, a person with high blood pressure is at a high risk of attacks and coronary heart disease.
  • Diabetes: When blood glucose levels associated with type 1 and type 2 diabetes increases, there is a certain amount of damage to the victim’s coronary arteries. As a result, the risk of coronary heart disease increases.
  • Obesity: People who are obese or are highly overweight may not be directly at risk of an attack, but they are at a greater risk of developing hypertension and diabetes. Overweight individuals also tend to have high cholesterol level that results from eating fat-rich diet.
  • Alcohol: Uncontrolled consumption of alcohol can develop high cholesterol levels and high blood pressure, thus augmenting the risk of coronary heart disease. Also, heavy drinkers tend to follow unhealthy lifestyles such as physical inactivity, consumption of high fat-diet and smoking.
  • Family history: If you have an immediate relative with a history of heart attack, then your chances of getting a stroke or attack doubles up in comparison to the general population with no immediate family history of an attack.
  • Age and Sex: With age comes greater risk of an attack and coronary heart disease. In addition, research suggests that men are at a greater risk of suffering from an attack than their female counterparts.
  • Intense outbursts of anger: Sudden and intense bouts of anger may also trigger a heart attack. In fact, it is estimated that there is an 8.5 times more tendency for a heart attack to occur within the initial two hours of an anger outburst.
  • Cold climate: Colder temperatures may constrict the arteries. This, in turn, raises the blood pressure, which is again a factor that may trigger a heart attack.
  • Miscellaneous factors: Acute anxiety and strenuous physical exercise may sometimes increase the pace at which the heart beats and the blood flow in the arteries. This may trigger a heart attack in rare cases. In addition, high binge of excessive junk food can escalate cholesterol levels in your arteries that eventually increase your heart rate, culminating into a heart attack.
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How Stress Can Break Your Heart

Most of us heard about the relationship between diet and heart disease. We know that too much cholesterol and fat in the body can trigger a heart attack. What about unhappy thoughts, stress and the feeling that life is going against you? Does your thinking affect your heart’s health?

Put your left fist, thumb on top, up to your breast bone, slightly to the left of the centre. Squeeze your fist hard and rhythmically. Your heart beats like this, some 100,000 times a day pumping about four quarts of blood through your body minute (and much more when you are stressed or are exercising)

Put your fist back up against your breast bone, thumb up. Squeeze it as hard as you can, again and again. Imagine doing this all day long, year after year, for a lifetime.

Oxygen is not the only vital substance that the heart pumps through the body. Hormones secreted by the pituitary gland, by the adrenal glands, by the thyroid, and by other glands are carried to every cell in the body. So are the products of digestion, such as glucose, vitamins and enzymes.

Blood does not randomly flow through the body, of course. It flows systematically through a seemingly endless series of arteries and veins. When oxygen enriched blood leaves the heart, it flows through large arteries and smaller arteries, and then through the very small arterioles. The arterioles give way t the tiny capillaries. Only when the blood has reached capillaries does it exchange its oxygen for carbon dioxide. At this point, the blood begins its journey back to the heart. For capillaries to venules to veins, the blood flows through ever widening pipes back to the heart.

The arterial vessels carrying freshly oxygenated blood from the heart can be viewed as life giver in this ital exchange; they bring oxygen, nutrients,, hormones and other substances to the body’s tissues. The veins guiding the “used” blood back to the heart can be viewed as the garbage disposal part of the system.

The Simple Formula

In medical school, doctors learn a simple formula: blood Pressure = Cardiac output x arterial Resistance. This means that your blood pressure level depends on how much blood the heart pumps per unit of time (cardiac output) and how difficult it is for the blood to move through the “pipes” (arterial resistance).

If your heart starts beating faster than normal, its output has increased. And greater cardiac output means increased blood pressure. Your heart is trying to move the blood through the “pipes” faster, and much work harder to do so. When it does this, your blood pressure increases.

When you exercise, your cardiac output and your blood pressure increase. In a young, healthy person, this increase is nothing to worry about. Eventually, the arteries relax, expand in size, and your blood pressure drops to normal.

But stress can also increase your cardiac output; it can make your heart beat harder and faster. In fact, stress may be a major cause of elevated blood pressure. When we are stressed, we may feel like nothing is going right, like we’re going to blow the big job, like we’re always behind. We feel that people are standing in your way, or we’re upset about being caught in traffic. When we’re stressed, the brain stimulates the sympathetic nervous system. In turn, the sympathetic nervous system prompts the adrenal medulla (the inside part of the adrenal glands) to pump out adrenaline like substances. This is turning increases the heart rate, and the strength of the beat. In other words, your thought alone can lead to increased cardiac output, which leads to higher blood pressure.

There’s a certain part of the brain, the hypothalamus, which we call the “pilot” of the brain because it controls so many body processes. The hypothalamus sits right above the pituitary gland. When the hypothalamus “reads” your negative thoughts and other signs of stress, it tells the pituitary to release a hormone called ACTH (adrenocorticotrophic hormone). ACTH then flows to the adrenal glands, where it directs them to release a number of hormones including some 42 varieties of cortisone. Amount other things; these hormones cause your body to retain salt and water. More fluid in the bloodstream means more work for the heart.

When stress is chronic, the blood vessels constrict (“tighten up”). Remember the equation, Blood Pressure = Cardiac output x Arterial Resistance? When the “pipes” get smaller, it’s harder for the blood flow thought them. Arterial resistance is increased, which means blood pressure goes up. Additionally, chronic stress changes the chemistry of the blood, making it more likely to clot. This means there’s great chance that a clot will form and lodge in a narrow artery in the heart, and cause heart attack; or it may lodge in the brain and lead to a stroke.

Having some stress in our lives is probably all right and may be helpful if it prompts us to action. Chronic stress, however, is hard on the heart.

Blood pressure = Cardiac Output x Arterial Resistance. It’s a simple formula. If you keep your heart working at normal speed and strength, if the resistance to the flow of blood through the arteries remains normal, everything will be fine. But if stress sets in motion the series of events that kicks your heart into high gear, and causes fluid retention and contracted arteries, your blood pressure will go up.

Cholesterol and Stress

Put your fist back up to your chest. Look down at the back of your fist. See the veins that are just beneath the skin? Imagine that these are your coronary arteries that supply fresh, oxygen rich blood to the heart muscle. Some of these vital arteries are only as wide as the tip of a pencil.

Let’s suppose that you’ve been eating a high fat, cholesterol rich diet and that some of your coronary arteries have narrowed not fatally so: a 50 percent blockage in this artery, a 60 or 75 percent narrowing in that. You can do reasonably well these kinds of blockages, unless stress causes cholesterol levels in the body to rise. Many studies have verified the relationship between stress and elevated cholesterol. If you throw people into ice cold water, their cholesterol will rise. If you threaten them, tell they’re going be fired, or tell them that they must take a difficult test, their cholesterol will go up.

Stress and elevated cholesterol are intimately related. Chronic anger, fear, “hurry-itis”, feelings that you are a failure, that life is out to get you; these thoughts increase blood pressure and cholesterol. Such thoughts can shorten your life. Cholesterol is more likely to be normal in people who have a positive, cheerful, confident, outlook on life.

Stress in the workplace

Work can be major source of stress. Specialists in the field of work induced disability now know that certain jobs are inherently stressful. Police work and fire fighting, for example, are highly stressful jobs; other kinds of work can also be stressful. Whether we are factory workers, clerks, attorneys, or chairmen of major companies, we often find ourselves under tremendous stress at work, on the way to work, and at home when we’re thinking about work.

For most of us, work related stress falls into two categories work overload and role conflict.

Work Overload: There are two types of work overload: Quantitative or qualitative. Quantitative work overload has to be with numbers: too many things to do in the day, too many thin phone calls to makes, too many orders to fill, too many boards to nail, too many clients to see. Too many things to do, in too little time. How often they are rushing around at work, trying to get everything done, but never quite succeeding? What is this doing to your heart, your body chemistry, your peace of mind and your health?

Qualitative work overload, on the other hand, has to do with standards that you cannot meet. You are called upon to perform beyond your ability. This happens when people are improperly trained. Or, you may be well qualified for one job, but find yourself promoted or transferred to a job that you aren’t as skilled at. The stress and frustration of trying to perform a different kind of work or to perform at higher levels, lead to work overload, mental distress and often physical disease.

It doesn’t take much overload to damage the heart. A study in the April edition of The New England Journal of Medicine reported on patients with coronary artery disease. The patients were asked to perform mental arithmetic, to complete a certain color word task, to give a speech, and to read aloud. The stress from these everyday tasks was enough to cause well motion abnormalities in many of the patients. (Wall motion abnormalities have to do with the way the heart muscle squeezes to pump blood).

Quantitative or qualitative work overload causes definite biochemical changes in the body, especially with respect to cholesterol levels. Many studies have shown the relationship between work overload and heart attacks, high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, and other potentially fatal disorders.

Role Conflict: Role conflict occurs when two or more pressures are in conflict with one another. It generates stress that causes mental distress, and man lead to actual physical disease. Research has shown that long tern role conflict leads certain people to experience high cholesterol, elevated blood pressure, obesity, heart disease and other medical problems.

Release valve

The steam engine is a marvelous invention. Coal is burned in the engine, a steam forms and the steam is used to activate the turbines. Seam engines do a lot of work, and they all have a safety valve, just in case too much steam builds up inside the engine. It’s a great idea: let off the excess steam rather than risk damaging the machinery.

In our houses, stores, office buildings and factories, all the electrical circuits have build in circuit breakers or fuses. When there is an electrical overload, the fuses automatically blow, putting an immediate end to the overload before it can cause any damage.

It would be nice if we had a safety valve that let off excess and inappropriate stress. We don’t have a safety valve, but our bodies give us warning signals when trouble is brewing, when we are overloaded, or in conflict. The warnings may be seemingly minor problems such as headaches, neck ache, backaches or, the waning may be in form of heaviness in the chest, heart palpitations, or high blood pressure. The latter are more serious warnings, and must b corrected right away. Unfortunately, we don’t have a safety valve, and sometimes our warnings come too late. We should reduce the stress n our lives before these warning signals occur.

Healthy Thoughts, Healthy Heart

Every year thousands of peoples have a heart attack. Although some survive, for others a fatal heart attack was their only warning that anything was wrong. Since stress is so intimately related for ways to keep our stress level as low as possible.

Some stressors can be dealt with easily; we can change our diet and stop smoking, for example. And we can take nutrients that help protect us against the effects of environmental pollution and chemicals in our foods. But what can we do about traffic, work overload and the like? What if we can’t find a new job, or move to a city where there is little traffic? How do we handle the stress?

We learn a lesson from Epictetus, The Roman Philosopher (A.D. 55-135) who said: “I am upset not by events, but rather by the way I view them.”

With the single statement, Epictetus gave us a “medicine” for many of our ills. If we can’t eliminate every stressor in our lives, we can change our attitudes. May be we have to take a major highway to work, and maybe it’s always crowded. We can’t change the traffic, but we can learn t change our thoughts about the traffic. You see, alone control your thoughts. You, and only you, determine what your thoughts will b, whether positive or negative.

You have absolute control over your thoughts, and every thought in your head influence your body, your immune system, and your health. Beat “thought disease” by changing you thoughts. Remember that stress and your thoughts have a profound influence on your heart. Your stomach isn’t the only thing tied in knots by stress. Help your heart by keeping your thoughts as healthy, positive, happy, and optimistic as possible. Even when things are going wrong, even if you are overloaded at work, fill your mind with healthy thoughts. Your healthy thoughts may not change your unhappy work situation, but they will most certainly help protect your heart from the ravages of stress.

We ‘humans’ have got the life a billion years ago. There have been five mass extinctions in earth’s history. We are living through the sixth. And now we too are running at a pace to end it all. This time it will be our fault.

The new discoveries and inventions have made our lifestyle full of convenience. But our bodies require work. Just like the sedentary water starts smelling, the sedentary lifestyle has given rise to many chronic diseases like the heart problems, diabetes and hypertension.

Today, the health researchers are suggesting that most of the chronic diseases that have appeared in man’s life are due to STRESS. From where it has come. It is the bi-product of our so-called modern lifestyle.

We are standing at the edge of cliff. Immediate actions are required to bring back the healthy days. We must incorporate exercise, balanced diet, sound sleep, and the most importantly happy and positive thoughts to our lifestyle to get rid of all health problems.

I believe “The opposite of great truth is also true.”

Day and Night, Work and Rest, Art and Science… they all looks opposite but my viewpoint is they compliment each other.

The more you relax, the more you active. Life is a balance between what we can and what we cannot. Learn to live between effort and surrender.

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Getting Relief From Heart Disease With Ayurveda

Till eighties, there was a belief that once you suffer from a heart disease, there is virtually nothing which can be done to stop or reverse the harm done. But according to the recent studies, it has been proven that Ayurveda can not only put a stop to the harm being done to arteries, but can also reverse the blockage. Certain Ayurveda practices contribute in increasing the blood flow to specific regions of the heart where adequate blood is not reaching. The coronary arteries get blocked because of inadequate blood supply.

What Do You Mean By Heart Disease?

Heart disease or coronary diseases are the commonest form of heart disease. The disease is actually malfunctioning of blood vessels which can also be a reason for fatal heart attack. One of the many cardiovascular diseases, heart diseases is the disease of the blood vessel system and heart. Some more common cardiovascular diseases include angina or chest pain, Rheumatic heart disease, stroke and high blood pressure.

Some of the reasons for contracting heart diseases are smoking, high blood cholesterol level, high blood pressure, diabetes, physical inactivity and obesity.

Home Remedies for Managing Heart Disease and Avoid It

  • Half teaspoons of ginger and garlic juice taken equally and when mixed with jaggery or honey, it makes the right tonic to be taken twice a day.
  • Juice of pumpkin, carrot and pomegranate, take around 2 glasses daily.
  • ½ tsp Methi seeds if soaked throughout one night in ½ cup water. Chew it the next day morning before taking anything else.
  • Practice Panchkarma to maintain heart dhara as it supports the right way of heart functioning. It also helps in maintaining Shirodhara that balances emotions. Do it under the supervision of an Ayurvedic practitioner.
  • Take a roll of cotton and soak it in warm sesame oil or ghee. Apply the pack of cloth for around fifteen minutes daily around the left side of your chest. This strengthens the heart functioning.
  • ½ tsp cow ghee is to be applied on your both temples and to be massaged gently for a minute. It will reduce stress and anxiety and will help you get peaceful sleep.
  • Meditation, brisk walking, yoga such as Kapalbharti and Anulom Vilom Pranayam should be a routine for daily basis.

People who suffer from diabetes also have annoying food cravings. Eat few healthy recipes to control food cravings.Healthy food recipes to be followed

1. Vegetable chila made of multi grain mix flour, Moong dal flour, salt, ginger garlic paste, coriander leaves chopped, grated bottle gourd, cabbage, green chili finely chopped, Turmeric powder and water.

2. Dalia salad made of crushed dalia, crushed onion and coriander leaves that are finely chopped.

There are various other Ayurvedic home remedies available which you can follow to control diabetes and heart disease. Take a diet meant for Detox to control the levels of blood sugar and improved heart functioning.

Fasting withy only ginger juice in lukewarm water for days can also help you stay healthy and fit.

Take only vegetables and Moong dal soup for 5 days at a stretch and after that for next five days consume only Moong dal and vegetable mixed with garlic and ginger paste, garam masala and turmeric powder.

After all these, start following a normal diet and following the above diet for Detox once a month will help you reduce extra fats, stiffness, swelling and Aam from your body. It will make you feel more agile, healthy and also aid in controlling your weight.

Many medicines are available in the market to keep your heart functioning properly, but unfortunately all of them are not as effective as expected. So, instead of consuming random medicines for heart ailments you can opt for the natural way with Ayurveda which has no adverse effects on the body and will help you get treated naturally. The various natural and Ayurvedic ingredients that are used in medicines for heart ailments are as follows:

Amla: Amla is a potent anti-oxidant that restricts strongly the free radicals from damaging the arteries. It also nourishes the heart tissues and helps in boosting your immune system along with your heart. This amazing fruit is one of the prime ingredients in Chywanaprash which is a delicious jam made with different types of natural herbs and gives strength and immunity.

Arjuna: Heart diseases are caused mainly because of congestion, hardening and inflammation of the arteries that causes restriction in blood flow. These hardened arties also put a lot of pressure on heart tissues and muscles. Known as Ayurveda’s wonder, this herb helps in the reducing congestive arteries, cardiac muscles strengthening and keeping the blood pressure low.

Triphala: Triphala is a perfect cure for people suffering from high cholesterol. It when combined with other herbs also breaks down the blood fats present in the body fast and effectively.

Ashwagandha: Tension is another cause of heart diseases and that is when this wonderful herb Ashwagandha comes to your rescue. It is known for reducing tension of the mind and the body and also helps in heart muscle strengthening.

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How Blood Pressure and Heart Attack Are Related

A heart attack is one of the most common reasons that cause almost 65% deaths annually as many reports suggest. It can occur anytime without giving any signs, but it doesn’t imply that one cannot know the chances of being in the danger zone of getting a stroke. There are plenty of reasons that can result in heart attacks, but blood pressure (BP) is closely related to it, and in most of the cases, it is the BP that triggers the heart attack.

Generally, people with high BP comes in the zone that is more prone to suffer a heart attack, but many recent studies state that low BP too can be a reason while most of them still stick that low blood pressure can never lead to a heart attack. No matter whether you have high or low BP, seeking medical guidance and ways to deal with it in order to prevent heart attack should be your primary concern.

With the main motive of keeping your BP under control to defeat and prevent yourself from being a sufferer of heart attack, we are discussing the causes, symptoms and other essentials.

Causes of high blood pressure

• Smoking
• Hypertension
• Family history
• Stress
• Genetics
• Too much consumption of salt
• Overweight
• Obesity

Causes of low blood pressure

• Pregnancy
• Heart diseases
• Dehydration
• Endocrine problems
• Severe allergy
• Blood loss
• Severe infection

Symptoms of high blood pressure

It is termed as “Silent Killer, ” and it has very few symptoms.
• Headaches
• Dizziness
• Nose Bleeding
• Blood spots in eyes

Symptoms of low blood pressure

• Dizziness
• Fainting
• Lack of concentration
• Nausea
• Blurred vision
• Pale skin
• Fatigue
• Slow breathing

Controlling High Blood Pressure

If you suffer from high BP, you can, of course, control it if you wish to. Below, we have shared a few steps you can take to control your high BP,
• Losing weight and getting in shape
• Quit smoking at the earliest
• Eat a healthy diet precisely DASH diet which means include more fruits and vegetables and consume fat dairy product in a small amount
• Lower the consumption of salt in your food
• Do regular aerobic exercise
• Limit your alcohol consumption

Controlling Low Blood Pressure

Controlling low pressure is equally important. Below, we have shared a few steps through which you can control your low BP.
• Consume salt in higher amount
• Start drinking lots of different types of drinks and limit your alcohol consumption
• Consult a doctor to see if any medication is causing you to suffer from low blood pressure
• Do regular exercise to maintain your blood flow
• Do lift heavy weight material
• Don’t indulge in hot water for a longer time, be it shower or spa
• If you are feeling dizziness frequently, limit the diet and eat smaller diet

So, these are all you want and need to know pressure and if you are suffering from any of these, start implementing the ways to control it right away. It is better to stay from anything that is closely related to the heart attack.

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Non-Tech Weapons To Buy Time – For Your Heart And Your Life

Fact One: Despite decades of medical advances, heart disease still kills millions of us.

Fact Two: What may finally help save us is anything but high-tech. While super-drugs and miracle surgery are vital in a crisis, some of the most powerful new weapons against heart disease include carrots, calcium and large helpings of TLC – as you’re about to read in this report.

Starting here, ways to lower high blood pressure with diet changes, not drugs (and modest changes, not major overhauls). Alongside, new briefs from the American Heart Association, where the power of vegetables and compassion made as much news as bio-engineering genes to keep arteries from re-clogging.

In this century millions of people found out that they were in much greater danger of having a heart attack than anyone thought. The reason: ‘High’ blood pressure had been re-defined, dropped from 160/95 to 140/90. (The first number reflects the pressure in arteries as the heart contracts; the second, the pressure between heartbeats.) As a result, those millions of people suddenly became “at risk” – rather than being classed as healthy, overnight they turned into candidates for some type of blood pressure-lowering treatment.

With luck, this revised yardstick won’t just shock, it will save lives – motivating the enormous number of us who aren’t even quite sure what our blood pressure is, to find out, and lower them. Two questions come up immediately, however: How much should they be lowered and how?

The “how much” part is pretty clear, though there’s a bit of leeway. Simply getting your blood pressure to 140/90 is good. Experts consider 120/80 even better and a reasonable goal for most people. But for the longevity-minded, 100/65 (without drugs) is the blood pressure associated with the least risk of cardiovascular disease and the longest expected lifespan.

How you lower your blood pressure is also somewhat flexible. There is a range of anti-hypertensive drugs that can help. However, most have drawbacks. For the reason, drugs should usually be a last resort. The first step is to work with your doctor on your diet. Not just keeping weight in line and reducing salt intake – though sodium, more than any other mineral, has been blamed for increases in blood pressure – but also increasing foods containing other minerals, particularly calcium, potassium and magnesium.

The evidence for the beneficial effect of these minerals is quite persuasive – enough so that ultimately they may become a standard part of the non-drug anti-hypertensive arsenal. In fact, important new findings on calcium and hypertension made health headlines. While the evidence builds, it’s quite feasible (with your doctor’s guidance) to start using these minerals now to try and help normalize blood pressure and protect your heart and overall health.

POTASSIUM: WHAT BANANAS CAN DO FOR YOUR HEART

Although many people know that sodium can raise blood pressure in some individuals, fewer are aware that potassium may counteract some of sodium’s effects.

For most of human history, people ate naturally high-potassium low-salt diets. But the last hundred years have seen a 20-fold increase in sodium consumption, along with a drop in potassium intake to about one-third of its previous level.

We do need some potassium. It helps maintain a balance between fluids inside and outside cells. It enables nerves and muscles, including the heart, to function properly. And it has another important role: A high potassium intake (3,000 mg to 4,000 mg daily, versus the average 1,200 mg) can help reduce blood pressure, according to the Joint National Committee on Detection, Evaluation and Treatment of High Blood Pressure in the U.S.

The evidence:

  • In a survey in America, people who consumed less than 1,200 mg of potassium per day had twice the incidence of hypertension as people who consumed over 3,600 mg per day.
  • A 12-year study by California researchers showed a 40 per cent drop in stroke-related deaths among those who consumed an extra 400 mg of potassium a day (the equivalent of a banana or a glass of skim milk). And in the same study, women whose total potassium intake was less than 1,900 mg per day had more than twice the chance of dying of a stroke as women who consumed more than 1,900 mg.

How does potassium reduce blood pressure, and thus heart attacks and strokes? Some researchers believe that high potassium levels block the absorption of sodium by the kidneys. Others suspect that potassium may work like a diuretic, lowering the volume of blood plasma and thus decreasing blood pressure.Whatever the mechanism, raising potassium intake – while cutting back on sodium – makes good sense if your goal is lowering blood pressure and improving heart health. The simplest, safest way to do this is just to eat plenty of high-potassium fruits (bananas, oranges, apples, and cantaloupes), leafy vegetables and whole-grain products. Potatoes, tomatoes, spinach and other foods will also do your potassium levels well.

If you are considering potassium supplements, first consult your doctor. Those with kidney problems and people taking certain types of drugs, including potassium-sparing diuretics, may not be good candidates.

CALCIUM: NOT JUST FOR TEETH AND BONES

Calcium is essential for healthy bones and teeth. But researchers are now finding it may also have a role in controlling blood pressure.

The evidence:

  • In studies of large populations in Honolulu and Puerto Rico, the higher the calcium intake, the lower the average blood pressure.
  • Researchers at the Oregon Health Science University found that hypertensive ingest an average 25 per cent less calcium than individuals with normal blood pressure.
  • When the same Oregon researchers had people with mild hypertension take a one-gram calcium tablet every day for eight weeks, their blood pressure numbers dropped 2 to 5 points.
  • Some animal studies show that high calcium diets may increase sodium excretion, suggesting one way calcium helps reduce blood pressure.
  • Calcium appears to relax muscles in blood vessels, letting blood flow through more freely – thus reducing blood’s pressure on artery walls.
  • Findings announced at the American Heart Association meeting indicate that for every glass of milk pre-school children drink daily, their systolic blood pressure is about 6 points lower. The preliminary conclusion: Adequate or better calcium intake during childhood (the skim milk equivalent of three to four glasses a day) may postpone or prevent high blood pressure in adulthood.
  • Also in a study, calcium supplements were shown to help prevent high blood pressure during the second half of pregnancy – a common risk and a major cause of premature babies.

Despite the growing evidence of calcium’s benefits, it is not recommended that all hypertensives routinely take calcium supplements without consulting the doctor. Most of the studies are “suggestive but inconclusive, ” says Matthew Gillman, M.D., of the Boston University School of Medicine. And for the most part, he points out; calcium seems to lower blood pressure only “a bit.”Still it makes sense to at least get 800 mg to 1,200 mg a day, and even more during pregnancy and nursing. (In the study above, the pregnant women took 2,000 mg of calcium per day.)

Where should you get your calcium? In addition to skim milk and dairy products (taking out fat increases calcium), many other foods contain calcium naturally.

Many doctors now recommend calcium or multi-mineral supplements for various reasons. If your does, calcium needs to be taken in about a two-to-one ratio with magnesium to be assimilated. (A good multi-mineral formula will take this into account.)

No matter how you get your calcium, don’t overdo it. In some people, excess calcium can cause kidney stones. The best advice: Stick to your doctor’s recommendations.

MAGNESIUM: THE NEGLECTED HEART PROTECTOR

Most of us don’t get the recommended amount of daily magnesium (280 mg for women, 350 mg for men) in our diets. Yet a number of studies indicate that even mild deficiencies in magnesium can contribute to high blood pressure, heart arrhythmias and heart attacks. The studies also show that simple improvements can counter these risks.

The evidence:

  • A huge study of 58,218 women conducted by Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston found that as magnesium intake rises, blood pressure declines.
  • The Honolulu Heart Study of 615 Hawaiian men showed that, more than any other nutrient, increased magnesium levels are associated with decreased hypertension.
  • When magnesium supplements were given to some 20 hypertension and/or heart patients by Swedish researcher Thomas Dyckner, after six months their systolic blood pressure had dropped 12 points.
  • In a California study researchers at City of Hope National Medical Center showed magnesium supplements can help prevent the blood clots that lead to heart attacks and strokes.

How does magnesium work? Apparently, it causes arteries to relax, whereas a lack of it makes them contract, increasing the pressure on vessel walls. Magnesium may also protect the arteries against stress by limiting the damage adrenaline surges can do. And magnesium aids heart health directly: It helps normalize erratic heartbeats (arrhythmias) in both well people and those who’ve had heart attacks, and it helps prevent heart enlargement.Despite the vital roles it plays, magnesium has received less attention than calcium. But anyone concerned about blood pressure and heart health should eat magnesium-rich foods daily – and consider limiting soft drinks. These are high in phosphates, which interfere with magnesium absorption. Magnesium in multi-mineral supplements can help ensure coverage.

Supplements are not a substitute for heart-wise eating habits, but they are useful for many people and are freer for side-effects than high-blood pressure medication. Even so, continue to rely primarily on vitamin and mineral-rich foods. They can contribute significantly to lowering your blood pressure and guarding your cardiovascular health.

We ‘humans’ have got the life a billion years ago. There have been five mass extinctions in earth’s history. We are living through the sixth. And now we too are running at a pace to end it all. This time it will be our fault.

The new discoveries and inventions have made our lifestyle full of convenience. But our bodies require work. Just like the sedentary water starts smelling, the sedentary lifestyle has given rise to many chronic diseases like the heart problems, diabetes and hypertension.

Today, the health researchers are suggesting that most of the chronic diseases that have appeared in man’s life are due to STRESS. From where it has come. It is the bi-product of our so-called modern lifestyle.

We are standing at the edge of cliff. Immediate actions are required to bring back the healthy days. We must incorporate exercise, balanced diet, sound sleep, and the most importantly happy and positive thoughts to our lifestyle to get rid of all health problems.

I believe “The opposite of great truth is also true.”

Day and Night, Work and Rest, Art and Science… they all looks opposite but my viewpoint is they compliment each other.

The more you relax, the more you active. Life is a balance between what we can and what we cannot. Learn to live between effort and surrender.

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What Is Carotid Artery Disease?

What is a Carotid Ultrasound?

Carotid ultrasound is sometimes called Doppler testing. It’s able to determine if your artery walls are narrowed and if you have some plaque in your arteries. It also shows a number of other important factors that include the direction and speed of your blood flow. It also includes the pressure of the blood on the artery walls, as well as the location of any potential blood clots.

If you have recently undergone surgery on your carotid arteries, this ultrasound will show how effective the procedure has been. It’s also used to determine the placement of a stent. It is a specialized type of mesh tube that is carefully inserted into the artery to help improve the blood flow by keeping the artery open and clear. A carotid ultrasound can also determine the effectiveness of the stent during follow-up visits with your cardiologist.

Will This Test be Uncomfortable or Painful?

The really nice thing about this test is that it is completely painless and non-invasive as it simply involves having an ultrasound wand moved over your neck. This will provide your cardiologist with real-time images of the blood flow in the arteries that are shown on a screen.

Sometimes this type of test will be used in conjunction with other procedures to provide a more definitive diagnosis. These tests may include CT scan, x-rays or an MRI. Maybe even an angiography which is a different type of scan where an injected dye will highlight any abnormalities in the arteries.

Who Should Have a Carotid Ultrasound?

A carotid ultrasound may be required to diagnose a problem or as part of a follow-up appointment for previous treatment. Your cardiologist may suggest this test as part of a routine preventative examination. For example; if you are more at risk of developing coronary heart disease. This could be the case if you have certain risk factors or a family history of this disease.

It might be worth having a carotid ultrasound if you have high blood pressure or high cholesterol, already have coronary artery disease or a family history of this disease. Even if your physician has picked up abnormal sounds on a stethoscope.

People who are particularly inactive or who smoke or who are extremely overweight may also benefit from this test. The great thing about this type of test is that when used as a preventative measure, it can detect the early signs of plaque buildup in the arteries. Hopefully, before any damage caused to the arteries is permanent.

Plaque consists of fat and calcium, and excess cholesterol. It tends to develop as a result of a lack of exercise or due to poor diet. The plaques that develop in arteries are initially soft and are filled with cholesterol, but if they rupture then they can cause an injury at the rupture site.

This resulting scar tissue will eventually become calcified. These areas of calcified healed plaque can interrupt the flow of blood, increasing the risk of blood clots that are more likely to block the blood vessels.

By detecting the presence of plaque at an early stage, your cardiologist will be able to provide medications to help reduce your risk of heart disease. Additionally, you will be able to make modifications to your lifestyle to help reverse the process.

This test can be a highly beneficial preventative procedure. Especially as it’s estimated that carotid artery disease causes between 10% and 20% of all strokes in the United States. There is the potential that this test could save your life, as a stroke could leave you with permanent brain damage or may even be fatal.

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Is Too Low Cholesterol A High Health Risk?

Impressive new data show that low total cholesterol may be just as hazardous as high. Is HDL all we really need to worry about?

One of the over-riding concerns of medical journalism in recent years has been high cholesterol. The dangers of LDL (the bad cholesterol) have been unremittingly highlighted, prefaced only by the caveat that cholesterol is necessary to good health.

But no one has ever really warned against the dangers of too low cholesterol. Certainly, no one has said that a depleted cholesterol supply can raise your mortality risk.

Now they are saying so. And they are backed by research evidence that’s solid and impressive. The evidence was reported last year in medical journals including BMJ (British Medical Journal), Cancer, and Circulation, a publication of the American Heart Association. Low cholesterol, the research shows, is more than a trivial concern.

The most dramatic conclusion:

“There is an association between low blood cholesterol and non-cardiovascular deaths in men and women.” There is no longer any doubt, report the experts, that the 6 per cent of middle-aged adults with cholesterol values below 160 milligrams/deciliter are at increased risk of dying from a variety of causes, which includes lung cancer, other non-colon cancers, respiratory disease, digestive disease, trauma, hemorrhagic stroke, and other residual causes.

And how solid and believable is the evidence? The report is based on a meta-analysis (a statistical pooling of data) of 19 studies on low cholesterol, and it’s likely to be quite some time before anyone produces scientific evidence that’s more conclusive.

One by one, these studies did not carry a lot of statistical power, but put together they are enough to draw conclusions – not necessarily that low cholesterol causes excess deaths but certainly that more men with low cholesterol die than those with “normal” (160-199 mg/dl) cholesterol.

How many more? For men with cholesterol lower than 160 mg/dl, risk is elevated between 14 and 22 per cent for all causes of death, compared to those with cholesterol between 160 and 200 mg/dl. That’s just about the same risk that men with cholesterol greater than 200 mg/dl had from heart disease. When you graph the death rate at increasing cholesterol levels, the curve forms a U, with the bottom of the U in the 160-200 mg/dl range.

What are They Dying From?

Heart Disease: Not surprisingly, most of the elevated risk was not from heart disease. Eleven of 18 studies did show some elevated risk of heart disease in low-cholesterol men, but one of the largest and most comprehensive – the Multiple Risk Factor Intervention Trial – actually found an 11 per cent lower risk. It seems fair to conclude that low cholesterol did not significantly increase or decrease heart disease risk compared to the normal group. And risk of cardiovascular disease did rise progressively in men (but not in women) with total cholesterol levels higher than 200 mg/dl.

(This, in fact, was one of the other interesting research conclusions, namely that “there is no association between high blood cholesterol and cardiovascular deaths in women… With the exception of those who already have coronary disease or other reasons for being at a comparably very high risk of CHD (coronary heart disease) death, it no longer seems wise to screen for and treat high blood cholesterol in women.”)

Cancer: Most of the extra risk at low cholesterol levels came from cancer and other problems. In men with cholesterol lower than 160 mg/dl, cancer rates were elevated by approximately 18 per cent compared to rates in the 160-200 mg/dl groups. This holds true for colon cancer, rectal cancer, lung cancer, and several others.

A new study, reported in Cancer, has also found increased risk of colon cancer with low cholesterol. Using the patients from the famous Framingham study – a sample of more than 5,000 men and women followed for nearly 40 years – the team, led by Bernard E. Kreger, M.D., M.P.H., found that a 20 mg/dl increase in total cholesterol lowered the risk of colon, but not rectal, cancer by about 15 per cent. Just as interesting, these researchers found a strong interplay between low cholesterol and body mass index (weight/height). The greatest risk of colon cancer – an elevation of 4.53 times – was in men with low cholesterol and high body mass index (overweight).

Other: Risk was elevated the most for a collection of non-heart, non-cancer causes of death, such as respiratory and digestive disease and injuries. In fact, both men and women with low, compared to normal, cholesterol had about 40 per cent greater risk. What’s more, the risk of these types of deaths dropped – down 11 to 25 per cent – for men with cholesterol over 200 mg/dl. compared to the normal group.

Injuries were a particularly deadly risk to men. Their increased risk was 40 per cent, compared to only 26 per cent of women. And data from the BMJ article suggest that much of that 14 per cent disparity may be self-inflicted. Swedish researchers followed over 26,693 men and 27,692 women for more than 20 years. During that period, 376 men and 139 women died from injuries. Of those sub-groups, 146 men and 44 women committed suicide. (All people with cancer were excluded from the data, because they may have had special incentive to take their own lives.)

That so many more men than women commit suicide is disturbing, but it’s not news. Higher suicide rates in men are well documented. But the Swedish scientists also cross-checked deaths from injuries and suicide with total cholesterol levels, and the numbers are dramatic.

In the first six years of the study period, the risk of injury for men with the lowest cholesterol turned out to be 2.75 times higher than for those in the highest cholesterol group, and suicide was elevated by 4.1 times! Strangely, though, the elevated risk disappeared by the end of the 20.5 year follow-up. This led the researchers to speculate that a decrease in cholesterol to below a person’s normal value may be more important than a habitually low level.

Why should low cholesterol make a person suicidal? No one knows, and it may, in fact, just be a side-effect of some other disorder. The Swedes did note, however, that low cholesterol has been found in criminals, aggressive people and those with low self-control. And studies of monkeys have shown behaviour changes when the animals are fed a diet low in saturated fat and cholesterol.

What to Do?

Understand, no one is questioning whether lowering total cholesterol is beneficial to people who have been diagnosed with heart disease. On that, at least, that data are clearly and consistently positive. But when you examine studies of otherwise healthy people who try to lower cholesterol, the results aren’t so clear or consistent.

Lowering total cholesterol definitely does reduce deaths from heart disease. But other causes of death increase, particularly if the patients are simply treated with cholesterol-lowering drugs. Treatments that include several approaches – drugs, diet and exercise, for example – don’t show such strong increases in non-heart-disease deaths.

The experts who were involved in extracting the data showing low cholesterol to be bad for you are very tentative about drawing conclusions that would suggest you change your behaviour. They want to be absolutely sure that this “sacred cow” really needs slaughtering to feed you hamburgers.

So where does this leave us? At the very least, with the same healthful skepticism we always carry toward taking drugs. If your doctor wants to put you on a cholesterol-lowering drug, ask questions. Get him to explain the rationale. Make sure he’s aware of this research and has taken it into consideration.

We also see no reason for you to make changes in diet based on this work. A low-fat, high-fibre diet has many other benefits besides lowering cholesterol, including reduced risk of several cancers and diabetes, just to name a couple.

Mainly, though, we’re left with the same impression we’ve had for some time: Total cholesterol just doesn’t tell the total story. Numerous studies have shown that HDL cholesterol (the good type) and its ratio to LDL or total cholesterol is a better predictor of heart disease risk. It’s not impossible for a person to have relatively high total cholesterol and lots of HDL at the same time. And it seems likely that very low total cholesterol is likely to go along with low HDL.

Big changes in cholesterol policy may be on the horizon, but those of us who’ve already adopted a healthful, preventive lifestyle have probably already implemented them.

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Understanding Two Heart Problems by Studying the Domino Effect of One Gene Network

The main function of cardiomyocytes, the heart muscle cells is pumping blood to other organs of the body. However, they can also carry genetic instructions and function as a nerve cell, liver cell, intestinal cell or any other cell type in the body.

Dr. Deepak Srivastava says, “At the moment in time that the fetal heart begins to develop, master switch proteins, called transcription factors, act like the first tile in an extremely complex pattern of dominos and set off a chain of events which lead to the activation of heart muscle specific genes in cardiomyocytes as well as the silencing of genes important for the development other cells types.”

The process creates functioning hearts in over 355000 babies born every day. However, it is not entirely flawless and often leads to heart defects. It’s noticed that almost 1% of babies are born with heart defects.

Gladstone Institutes scientists have studied a family with a history of heart defects in order to understand how gene network acts in a wrong way that may cause heart defects and even heart diseases in the later stages of life. In 2003, the family consulted Deepak Srivastava, the head of the cardiovascular institute at Gladstone. Their problem was critical and rare. Half of the kids in the family were born with a hole in the wall between the two chambers of their hearts.

After an analysis, the Gladstone team found that all the children, born with a hole in the wall, had a mutation in their GATA4 gene. It leads to a heart transcription factor protein. All the children developed a heart disease such as poor heart pumping after seven years. Even though the two heart diseases were not directly related, however, Srivastava’s team believed that GATA4 mutation was responsible for both.

The team was eager to fissure out how the GATA4 mutation could lead to the two heart problems. In the process, they collected skin samples of the children and created cardiomyocytes. They also collected samples from their healthy siblings, so that they could conduct a comparative analysis in the laboratory. All the tests showed that the cells with GATA4 mutation demonstrate weakened function in comparison with the healthy cells.

The team also examined how the GATA4 protein interacted with protein TBX5. It’s seen that both the proteins control genes by interacting and binding to DNA. The study showed that in the cells with damaged GATA4, protein TBX5 did not tie well with the DNA. The team also found that GATA4 mutation creates an obstacle in the interaction with TBX5, so the non-heart specific genes cause more disturbances in cardiomyocyte development.

Deepak Srivastava stated, “By studying the patients’ heart cells in a dish, we were able to figure out why their hearts were not pumping properly. Investigating their genetic mutation revealed a whole network of genes that went awry, first causing septal [heart wall] defects and then the heart muscle dysfunction.”

GATA4 and TBX5 are the first domino tiles that belong to an intricate network of genes. So thinking of a treatment with these proteins would not be practical. Moreover, if they are blocked, they might lead to a worse situation. So, finding a medicine that would impact a particular set of GATA4/TBX5 actions might lead to a new therapy to cure heart diseases.

Yen-Sin Ang, the first author on the report, said, “It’s amazing that by studying genes in a two-dimensional cluster of heart cells, we were able to discover insights into a disease that affects a complicated three-dimensional organ. We think this conceptual framework could be used to study other diseases caused by mutations in proteins that serve as master regulators of whole gene networks.”

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Heart Bypass Surgery in India

A heart bypass surgery aims at replacing the damaged arteries inside the heart. In this surgery, a surgeon uses blood vessels from another part of the body to repair the damaged arteries. This operation is also termed as coronary artery bypass surgery.

This operation is performed when the arteries get damaged/blocked. Oxygenated blood is supplied to the heart’s muscles via the coronary arteries. If they get blocked, the heart cannot function properly and may lead to heart failure.

When do we need a heart bypass surgery?

Plaque is a material in the blood, which builds up on the walls of the arteries and lowers the blood flow to the heart. As the heart doesn’t receive enough blood, the muscle is more likely to tire and fail. It affects the left ventricle, the heart’s primary pump.

This surgery is recommended by a doctor only if your coronary arteries get blocked/narrowed. In this case, you’re at a high risk of a fatal heart attack. This is also called as atherosclerosis. This surgery is usually performed when the blockage is too severe to be managed with medication or treatment.

Success Rate for this Heart Surgery

The present survival rate for heart bypass surgery is around 95 to 98 percent, i.e., between 2-5% of all patients have complications, including death. The success rate has improved over time. According to research, 80-95% of patients who have undergone bypasses with a segment of the mammary artery are still performing well even ten years after surgery. Two-thirds to 75% of patients who had grafts from leg veins had unrestricted blood flow even after ten years.

Remember, if your grafts get blocked, you won’t need another bypass surgery to be done. However, you might be eligible for balloon angioplasty and insertion of a stent.

How much does it cost?

The price of this heart bypass surgery in India is much lower than that in any other developed country. The average cost for this surgery in India is around $10,000 compared to $30,000 in the USA. The prices mentioned above are just given only for your guideline and are the average cost of surgeries in some good hospitals in India and USA. The top hospitals in these two countries might charge higher rates.

In a Nutshell

Only in India, you will find high-quality medical procedures with 70 to 90 percent savings over the United States. Surgical operations in India are performed at JCI accredited hospitals. Surgeons and physicians are highly qualified and well educated in India. Most of them obtained their medical degrees from respected universities in English speaking countries. This is the reason the competency level of Indian Health Care Providers is in proportion with the United States. In India, the prolonged stay in the hospital after surgery, i.e., the recovery period gives you an opportunity to resume your normal activities much sooner after discharge from the hospital. Since the official language in India is English, you won’t have any communication difficulties with medical staff.