You must be familiar that exercising and following a good diet can help keep your heart healthy. However, what else can be done to keep the ticker going strong? Here are a few key things you can do to keep your heart working efficiently. By incorporating these habits into your lifestyle, you can make your cardiovascular health the best it can be.
1. Eat Healthy Fats
Fats are an important part of your diet. Therefore, you must include healthy fats, including saturated fats, unsaturated fats, and polyunsaturated fats in your everyday diet. One type of fat that you should not consume if you want a healthy mindset, is trans-fat.
Importantly, trans-fat can increase the risk of having a stroke or developing heart disease over a lifetime. This happens because trans-fat clogs the arteries along with raising bad cholesterol levels (LDL). Moreover, good cholesterol levels (HDL) are lowered as a consequence, too. By cutting unhealthy fats from your diet, you can enhance the blood flow throughout the body.
2. Practice Good Dental Hygiene
Dental health can significantly improve your overall health, including your cardiovascular health. You may have never realized it but periodontal or gum diseases have similar kinds of risk factors for heart diseases.
Importantly, studies suggest that bacteria that cause gum diseases can travel into the bloodstream. As a consequence, it can lead to an elevation of C-reactive protein, which is a marker for the blood vessels getting inflamed. These changes can significantly increase the risk of heart stroke and disease.
3. Get Sufficient Sleep
Sleep is another essential thing to ensure cardiovascular wellness. If you don’t get enough sleep, there can be increased risks of cardiovascular diseases no matter what health habits you have or what your age is.
Notably, one study has revealed that adults who sleep for fewer than six hours per night are more likely to experience a heart attack or stroke compared to people who sleep six to eight hours every night. Moreover, research has also found that not sleeping enough can cause disruption in different underlying biological processes and health conditions, including inflammation and blood pressure. Given that, you must sleep for seven to eight hours daily to keep cardiovascular diseases at bay.
4. Avoid Sitting for Too Long
In recent years, studies have also suggested that sitting for long periods of time can have a very bad impact on your health, even if you exercise. Indeed, this is bad news for everyone who has to sit at a sedentary job all day long.
If we look at the combined results of different observational studies, it can be seen that people who sit all day have 147 percent increased chances of developing cardiovascular diseases. Also, the death rate was 90 percent greater in these individuals.
Given that, if you have to have good cardiovascular health, make sure to move your body throughout the day. Take shorter walks, use a standing workstation, or take the stair instead of the elevator.
Strengthening cardiovascular health is important as it will guarantee your overall health and will keep your body go strong for a long time.
