Keep heart diseases away with a healthy lifestyle

Only after our close ones get affected by a disease, do we realize how important a healthy lifestyle is. Today i.e., 29th September is observed as the World Heart Day and this year’s message is “Heart Choices, not Hard Choices”. Two to three decades ago and now also heart diseases are one of the leading causes of so many deaths around the globe. Doctors advise people over 35 years of age to go for screening. The advice is especially for Indians since our diet contains more fat when compared to western countries. The screening helps in detecting symptoms of heart diseases like hypertension, diabetes and increased lipids. The way heart diseases are affecting the world is also changing. Western countries have adopted the well proven “prevention is better than cure”. However, developing countries are still struggling with cardiovascular problems. According to a recent survey, 50 percent of the patients are of cardiovascular diseases. Statistics also say that around 900 people die of heart attack every day. That means 4 casualties every minute and most of these casualties belong to the 30 – 50 age group.

Consuming tobacco, alcohol, lack of exercise and unhealthy diet – all these contribute to weakening your cardio system. If these factors are not controlled, this death rate will increase by 40 percent by 2025. Along with a lazy lifestyle, today’s youth has taken strong liking for fast food such as burgers, pizzas and fizzy soft drinks. These can lead to serious cardiovascular diseases. Now heart problems can even be observed in women despite of estrogen which has protective effects against heart problems.

In order to have a healthy heart, the first fact that should be accepted is that there is no shortcut to it, only the hard way. Regularly exercising is always the best option to keep your heart and body in good shape. We need to adopt food by their nutritional value rather than for entertainment. Doctors suggest habit of exercising should be adopted from as early as 15 years of age. Today a number of fitness apps have been released which can count the number of steps walked, distance run etc. these apps can be integrated into your routine so you will know how much exercising you need and how much you actually do.