Following some simple healthy heart guidelines can make a huge difference when it comes to the cardiovascular disease. Considering the fact that it causes 1 in every 3 deaths in the US, doing your best to prevent it is essential for survival. People greatly underestimate the power of unhealthy habits. Therefore, the majority of the population does not realize that several simple changes in their routine and diet can literally save their lives.
Healthy Heart Guidelines for Everyone
- Have a diverse diet of healthy foods
Although there are some specific dietary regulations when it comes to heart health support for seniors, most people don’t need a special diet. To make your meals heart-friendly, you only need to eliminate greasy and processed foods. Saturated fat is the heart’s enemy #1.
In the meantime, you should diversify your meals so that you get a wide range of nutrients daily. Eat legumes, whole grains, fresh fruits and veggies, poultry, and fish. What you should look for in your dishes is fiber and heart-friendly fats. You can also get some extra heart benefits by adding specific supplements. For example, Omega 3 EPA/DHA provides you with essential omega 3 fatty acids that are rare in the American diet. Beta-Sitosterol is a great product for maintaining a healthy level of ‘good’ HDL cholesterol.
- Stop cluttering your diet with ‘empty’ foods
It’s not only processed snacks and synthetic junk foods that are bad for your cardiovascular system. If you want to be as healthy as possible, you need to revise your meal plan and eliminate all products that don’t do you any good.
It’s a matter of good nutrition and weight management. The more ‘empty’ calories you consume, the more food you’ll need to eat in order to avoid nutritional deficiencies. Thus, you’ll be overeating and gaining extra pounds. This leads to obesity, which is the major risk factor for heart disease.
- Stop smoking and avoid any secondhand smoke
To stop smoking is one of the healthy heart guidelines that are good for more than your heart. This habit is extremely dangerous and it’s a fact that smoking increases the risk of lung cancer. It’s also bad for the environment, and even economy if you consider how much of the taxpayer’s money goes to dealing with the problems caused by smoking.
Dropping this habit can be extremely hard, but there are many specialized programs and support groups you can use. Find the one in your area online and you’ll get lots of support from likeminded people.
Don’t forget that secondhand smoke is just as bad. Therefore, you should never feel obliged to remain in the company of smokers.
- Go for a daily walk
No healthy heart guidelines list can go without a mention of physical exercise. Your heart is a muscle, and it needs a good workout to stay in shape. You can see how fast muscle tissue becomes weak if you don’t get any physical exercises. Your heart is similar, even despite the fact that it literally never stops working.
The best heart-friendly workout requires that you work out as many calories as you consume. This would definitely be the way to go if you want to maintain a healthy weight. However, most people don’t have the time to get a thorough workout daily. In this case, a few cardio sessions throughout a week and a 30-minute daily walk are what you need.
Your minimum plan should be to get about 75 minutes of rigorous exercise and 150 minutes of moderate physical activity a week.
Can You Follow Healthy Heart Guidelines?
As you can see, the rules that can help keep your heart healthy are truly simple. In fact, they are the basic guidelines of a healthy living. It will be easy to incorporate them into your life if you focus on developing these habits.
