It’s damned important to take care of your heart for living a long and healthy life. Your “heart age” may in fact be older than you are.
According to Stats Canada, heart disease is the next cause of mortality in the country behind cancer. It accounts for nearly one in five deaths. It is therefore important to take care of your heart to live a long and healthy life. But did you know that your heart may actually be older than you are?
If you have one or more cardiovascular risk factors, your heart may actually be older than you! For example, even if you are only 55, your heart could be the same age—and therefore be at the same risk for heart attack—as someone who is 65!
There are a multiple factors that can impact the health of your heart and increase your risk of having a cardiac event. Some of these factors are beyond your control:
- Your age
- Your gender (men are at higher risk than pre-menopausal women)
- Your family history of cardiac disease (parents, brother, sister)
Other risk factors, on the other hand are controllable, meaning it is possible to make changes to reduce their impact on your heart:
- Smoking
- Diabetes
- High blood cholesterol
- High blood pressure
- Lack of physical activity
- Excess weight
- Alcohol
Rejuvenation is possible for your heart and reduce your risk of heart disease by taking steps to alter these controllable risk factors. For example you should carefully follow your diabetes, high blood pressure, and high cholesterol treatments . Best to adopt healthy lifestyle habits such as 10,000 steps per day. A young heart ❤️ is a healthy heart .
