Boost Your Heart Health: Top Lifestyle Changes to Make

February is Heart Health Month, and the focus is on educating patients about cardiovascular disease control and reducing the risk factors for heart attack and stroke. While many people understand how serious heart-related health problems can be, fewer understand that the lifestyle changes needed for a happy, healthy heart are not that difficult.

Let’s take the advice of cardiovascular experts to heart, not just in February, but every month of the year, and learn how to reduce the risks and take the right steps toward heart disease control and prevention.

Why Family History Matters For Heart Disease Risk Factors

If many people in your family have had heart problems, the first and most important thing to discuss is the influence of heredity or family history on your risk factors for heart disease and stroke. Knowing your family history is important and can help you take additional steps (including earlier diagnostic testing) to protect yourself.

Some health conditions are hereditary, and that includes many that can predispose you to heart problems. High blood pressure (hypertension), obesity, and high cholesterol levels are problems that may be common in your family history. Some of that is genetic predisposition, and much of it is also lifestyle factors, such as diet.

People with a known family history of cardiovascular disease, heart attack, or stroke should disclose the information to a healthcare provider. Then, regular testing can help patients through early detection and coaching for proactive management and prevention.

Genetic Testing for Heart Disease Risk Factors

If you maintain a healthy weight and have normal cholesterol and blood pressure, you may still have a risk of heart disease. That is because your chance of having a heart attack or developing heart disease can be influenced by heredity or your family history.

Advances in genetic testing, or what they call precision medicine, may be able to predict whether someone has a higher-than-average risk of heart disease, stroke, or other cardiovascular diseases. Your gene variations (and those of your family members) can create a genetic risk profile.

Do you really want to know if you may have a heart attack? While it may not be good news that you may have a predisposition to cardiovascular disease or other heart health risk factors, it can help you plan ahead. Making important lifestyle changes and following the guidance of your primary care provider can help you lower those risks.

What Changes Can You Make Right Now to Protect Heart Health?

The most important thing you can do to protect the health of your heart is to become aware of the simple lifestyle changes you can make that can reduce your risk of heart disease and other cardiovascular problems.

There are many lifestyle changes that can have a positive impact on heart health.

1. Stop Smoking

Anyone who smokes cigarettes or uses tobacco products is infinitely aware of the associated health risks. In fact, for many people, every time they reach for a cigarette, they may have the same thoughts about quitting smoking. They know they need to break the habit, but it is so difficult to do it alone.

Most smokers could tell you stories about how many times they have lasted after quitting smoking. Some people have been able to transition to smokable cannabis, but even cannabis has harmful VOCs that can be released, whether you pack a bowl or cone.

Did you know that in less than thirty minutes after quitting smoking, your heart rate and high blood pressure will normalize? Nicotine is a very addictive substance because it is a stimulant. But every time you ingest nicotine, it harms the inside of your blood vessels, which reduces the amount of oxygen your heart receives.

Is vaping better? While health organizations in America say that vaping is just as bad as cigarette smoking, other countries like the United Kingdom are encouraging patients to give up tobacco and take up vaping instead. The nicotine delivered through a vape is still harmful to heart health.

However, vaping has fewer carcinogens and other harmful chemicals when compared to cigarettes. Many people have used vaping successfully to quit smoking and taper down the amount of nicotine they consume daily. The less nicotine and volatile chemicals you inhale, the happier your heart will be.

2. Choose Nutrient-Rich Foods

Both fruits and vegetables today have less nutrient content than they did fifty years ago. Not only is it difficult to make sure you are getting the proper amount of fruits and vegetables daily, but many health experts suggest you need to be eating more of them because they are less nutrient-dense, thanks to modern food supply methods and industrial agriculture.

Mindfulness is needed to look at food differently. What are you eating every day, and how many nutrients is your body absorbing to fuel your heart and immune system? Malnutrition is a problem in the United States, thanks to rising inflation and cost of living. When budgets are tight, people may opt for less expensive (and less healthy) dietary choices.

While the processed meats and food aisles at your local grocery store may be packed, have you ever noticed that the fruits and vegetables section is usually a ghost town? They take more effort to prepare than convenience foods, but when you are aware of how little value those foods provide to your body, you can make a conscious effort to eat more “real food” and prepare it yourself.

Convenience foods are also high in sodium and saturated fat. If your diet regularly consists of junk food, salt, and bad fat consumption, it can cause an exponentially increased risk of heart disease. Feed your body well, and protect your heart.

3. Hydrate With Water

That stuff that comes out of your kitchen tap is an important part of keeping your heart health on point. Sure, there are many more exciting beverages to choose from, including juice, soda, milk, alcoholic beverages, energy drinks, and more.

The problem with many drinks that taste great is that they have a lot of extra chemicals inside them. Even bottled water can have high levels of sodium, which is bad news if you have hypertension (high blood pressure) already.

What your heart actually needs is plain old water, and a lot of it on a daily basis. You see, your heart is beating about 72 times per minute (on average), and every day, it pumps and recycles over 7,000 liters of blood. Your blood vessels work better and supply oxygen to all organs and areas of your body best when you are hydrated.

The bad part is that the human body isn’t great at letting us know when the fluid levels are dropping to dangerous levels. Wouldn’t it be great if it had a “check engine” light like your car? By the time you actually feel thirsty, you could be very dehydrated and doing damage to your body. The best way to tell is the color of your urine. Hydrated people have very pale urine; the darker the color, the more dehydrated you are.

Men should be drinking at least 15.5 cups of water, or 3.7 liters, every day, and women should be drinking at least 11.5 cups or 2.7 liters daily. If you live in a hotter area of the United States, you may need more than that to stay healthy. Get yourself one of those big bottles (or a cool Stanely Cup since those are all the rage), and hit your minimum fluid levels daily to help protect your heart.

4. Monitor Your Cholesterol Levels

First, fats were bad. It wasn’t long ago that health “experts” were encouraging people to eat more fiber and carbohydrates and avoid fat as much as possible in their diet. Then we learned that high carbohydrate diets were also a bad idea; they increase the risk of heart disease and diabetes.

Your body needs good unsaturated fats, which include:

• Canola, sunflower, soy, and olive oils.
• Nuts and seeds (walnuts, pecans, almonds, pumpkin, and sesame seeds are the best).
• Fatty fish.
• Avocados.
• Beans and some lentils.

For optimal health, we should all avoid saturated fats as much as possible. Sources of those bad saturated fats include:

• Red meat.
• Butter.
• Cheese.
• Ice Cream.
• Coconut and Palm oil.

The worst fats that have the most detrimental impact on our health are also some of the tastiest ones. That is why you will find most junk food or convenience pre-prepared foods to be high in sodium and trans fat.

Try to avoid these foods at the grocery store, and your heart will thank you:

• Margarine (stick to butter!).
• Commercially baked goods (pies, cakes, or cookies).
• Bakers shortening.
• Microwave popcorn.
• Fried foods (french fries, fried chicken, doughnuts).
• Nondairy coffee creamers.
• Frozen pizza or pasta meals.

When you are focused on eating healthier, it helps to remember this trick. The healthiest foods you can buy at your local grocery store are generally on the outside aisle: dairy, meat, seafood, vegetables, and fruit. The stuff that is actually bad for you tends to be in the middle aisles.

Stop paying for foods that offer no benefit to your body, especially types of foods that can contribute to heart disease risk factors, stroke, or heart attacks. Healthy eating is the “new cool,” and there are many free online resources to help you biohack better nutrition.

5. Address High-Blood Pressure (Hypertension)

Hypertension is one of many conditions that are called “silent killers” because you may not even know that you have high blood pressure. Often, patients find out while consulting a physician on other symptoms, such as weakness in the legs, chronic headaches, and slow-healing wounds. Some people also suffer from recurrent heavy nose bleeds related to hypertension.

Why is high blood pressure a bad thing for your heart? Over time, chronic hypertension can do damage to arterial function. If veins were city streets in your body, arteries are more like a freeway when it comes to supplying blood to various areas of the body.

Hypertension can damage arteries and make them rigid (hardened arteries). The loss of elasticity or flexibility of the arteries causes decreased blood and oxygen flow to your heart. This is the leading cause of heart disease, and it can also cause intermittent moderate to severe chest pain or Angina.

High blood pressure is also the leading cause of heart attack and stroke. Check your blood pressure regularly, and if you get hypertensive readings at home, schedule an appointment to talk to your doctor as soon as possible. Prescription medications can help lower blood pressure and reduce your risk of heart disease or other adverse events.

6. Make Physical Activity a Daily Priority

We know that our bodies are counting on us to engage in regular physical activity. No matter what you do daily, walking or playing ball with your dog, doing household chores like laundry, cooking, or grocery shopping, all add up to moving, burning calories, and a happier heart.

Exercise not only gets your heart pumping, but muscles can pull oxygen out of your blood more easily when you are moving with purpose. Cortisol (the human stress hormone) takes a nosedive when you are physically active, and that gives your heart a bit of a (healthy) break. Exercise is also a natural way to help lower blood pressure.

How many steps should you be taking a day? Some suggest at least 10,000, but that can be hard to do after work, for example, when you are feeling tired. There are so many exciting new ways to get daily exercise, including the new Meta Quest VR Fitness App. Who said exercise has to be boring?

7. Find Your Healthy Body Weight

Being overweight increases your risk of developing cardiovascular diseases, including high blood pressure, stroke, coronary artery diseases, and more. When you carry excess weight, your heart has to work that much harder to supply oxygen and nutrients to your body.

People who achieve and maintain a healthy weight have a lower overall risk of cardiovascular disease (CVD). One of the reasons is that improved cholesterol levels (lower bad cholesterol or LDL) and triglycerides happen when you eat a balanced diet, exercise regularly, and maintain a healthy weight.

Lower body weight is also linked to better blood sugar control. Even if you have not been diagnosed with diabetes, periodic elevated blood glucose can damage blood vessels and cause insulin resistance over time. Blood that has high sugar levels is thicker in consistency and moves more slowly through veins and arteries. This also allows bad fats to accumulate in the walls of arteries and veins, which increases blood pressure and strain on the heart.

8. Create Healthy Sleep Habits

If you snore a lot or find yourself waking up regularly and feeling unrested, you may have sleep apnea. It is a breathing condition that disrupts normal sleep patterns, leading to fatigue, poor sleep quality, and other serious health risks.

There are three types of sleep apnea:

• Obstructive Sleep Apnea (OSA): The most common type of sleep disruption, it happens when the muscles in the throat relax too much, causing the airway to narrow or become blocked.
• Central Sleep Apnea (CSA): When the brain fails to send the correct signals to the muscles that control breathing during sleep.
• Complex Sleep Apnea Syndrome (CompSA): The combination of causes from obstructive sleep apnea and central sleep apnea that disrupt breathing during sleep.

Untreated sleep apnea can increase cardiovascular risks, as the disruption to normal oxygen levels places recurrent strain on the heart. Over time, that can increase the risk of a heart attack or stroke.

9. Manage Stress Levels Better

Finding healthy ways to reduce stress is critical to maintaining a healthy heart. When the body experiences stress, it can cause increased heart rate, elevated blood pressure, and problems such as arrhythmias (irregular heartbeat). Chronic stress can also increase your risk of developing blood clots, which are the leading cause of heart attacks and strokes.

The human body was not designed to cope with chronic stress. The experience of stress and the increase in adrenalin and cortisol (stress hormone) were meant to help us when we are in danger. Think of it as similar to a turbo boost of mental and physical alertness we need to protect ourselves.

Contemporary life can cause chronic stress. Rather than a temporary peak level of cortisol, adrenaline, and physiological changes that are caused by stress can occur on a daily basis. Chronic stress can hurt your heart; discuss (and implement) stress management strategies with your health provider.

10. Reduce Alcohol Intake

A glass of wine a few times per week (particularly dry red wine) is good for your health. That is the rumor based on very little clinical research that has people thinking that there are few to no negative side effects to drinking alcohol as long as you do not become addicted and develop alcoholism.

Recent clinical health studies suggest that NO amount of alcohol is actually safe for you. Even small quantities, consumed infrequently, can have detrimental effects on human health.

Drinking alcohol regularly can cause a variety of heart health problems:

• Cardiomyopathy.
• Hypertension.
• Arrhythmias.
• Increased risk of ischemic or hemorrhagic strokes.
• Atherosclerosis.
• Cardiovascular disease.
• Metabolic syndrome.
• Obesity.

One of the reasons why cannabis-infused beverages are surging in popularity as an intoxicating but potentially less harmful alternative to alcohol. Cannabis beverages are widely available in Massachusetts for people who are interested in trying them as an alternative to alcoholic beverages.

What The Heart Wants

The superpowered engine in your chest is like any other piece of machinery; it needs some basic regular essentials and diagnostic testing for optimal performance. Make lifestyle changes that put your heart health first. Eat well, exercise often, hydrate, get consistently high-quality sleep, and find healthy ways to manage stress.

Get tested regularly for hypertension (high blood pressure). If diagnosed with hypertension, make sure you take your prescriptions correctly every day. It will help stabilize your blood pressure (with other lifestyle changes like regular fitness) and may substantially reduce your risk of heart disease or stroke.