If you want to survive to a ripe old age, you must look after your heart. It supplies all of your vital organs with lifesupporting blood. When your heart stops so does your brain and your body!
Disease of the arteries that supply blood to the heart muscle (the coronary arteries) is the biggest killer in the UK. These are called coronary arteries because they circle the heart like a crown (the word for crown in latin is corona). So coronary artery or coronary heart disease is disease of those arteries supplying the heart muscle. If any muscle loses its blood supply it stops or fails to function normally.
While we’re on the subject of medical names, let me just tell you that you’ll hear all sorts of words related to heart disease, eg myocardial infarction, coronary thrombosis, coronary artery disease, myocardial ischaemia, cardiovascular disease, coronary insufficiency etc. yet all they mean is impaired supply of blood to the heart muscle. When the heart muscle doesn’t get a good supply of blood, it can’t function properly and then patients get troublesome symptoms.
The health of your heart mainly depends on the state of your coronary arteries. If they become ‘furred up’ or narrowed by going into spasm, then heart disease ensues.
The causes of heart disease
Causes of diseases are known as ‘risk factors’ and the major risk factors for heart disease include:
- Smoking
- High cholesterol
- High blood pressure (BP)
- Inactivity
- Obesity
- Diabetes
Having heart disease in your family is also a risk factor, but this may be due to an inherited tendency to high cholesterol, blood pressure, obesity and diabetes. Your age is an also an obvious major risk factor, because heart disease increases as we all get older. Your gender also used to be a risk factor, with men being more prone to heart disease, but now women are rapidly catching up!
Your GP can actually work out your risk of getting not just disease of your heart (coronary) arteries but also those supplying your brain, ie risk of stroke. It’s referred to as your CVD (cardiovascular disease) risk estimation. The risk s/he calculates is the probability of you getting a heart attack or stroke within the next 10 years. Ideally everyone over 40 should know their CVD risk, and if it’s over 20% you must change your lifestyle! Your GP will advise you.
The symptoms of heart disease
Symptoms are what you feel as the patient. The symptoms of heart disease, especially those of narrowing or blockage of the heart’s (coronary) arteries include: chest pain, which often feels like a heavy weight on the chest, or a crushing feeling or tight band around the chest. This pain may radiate up into the neck, especially the left side of the neck and then even down into the left arm.
This pain may be due to angina, which is chest pain, brought on by exertion in someone with narrowed coronary arteries, but it is usually relieved by resting. This pain continuing despite resting may well be a heart attack and warrants a ‘999’ call. Do not delay, especially if the patient is pale, sweating, and obviously looking ill. At this stage most patients admit to ‘a terrifying feeling of impending doom!’... as if they knew that they were facing death!
Patients with narrowed coronary arteries may experience some of these symptoms, but they are relieved by just resting or using a medication (under the tongue tablet or spray) that actually dilate, or open up, the coronary arteries. These patients have angina, and are well informed on how to control their symptoms, and will also be usually well informed at reducing their risk factors of getting further heart disease.
I could give you even more advice but if you just address smoking, cholesterol, BP, weight and walking you are well on the way to improving not only your heart health but so many other aspects of your health. All I can say is: “I’ve given you the best advice, and I only hope that you can follow it! None of it is easy, but do your best!”
Avoiding heart disease
Because heart disease affects nearly 3 million of us in the UK, and causes 110,000 deaths annually, we should all be trying to reduce our risk. So here’s my advice:
STOP SMOKING: This is not easy (I know because I’ve run NHS Smoker’s Clinics for over 30 yrs!) but it does reduce your risk of so many other more serious diseases as well as heart disease eg stroke, cancer of the lip, tongue. gullet, lung, bladder etc.
KNOW YOUR NUMBERS: That is know your BP (blood pressure), and your cholesterol. Your BP should be no higher than 130/80, and your cholesterol should be under 5. Ask your GP for advice on reducing your BP and cholesterol.
WEIGHT: Whatever your weight, get it into the normal range – if you’re overweight you know exactly what your ideal weight should be! I know it ain’t easy but you must get your weight down to normal levels not only for ‘health reasons’ but also for ‘self reasons’!
ACTIVITY: Whatever your weight or other risk factors for heart disease, you must do 30 minutes of regular exercise every single day! All that means is walking, every single day! You don’t have to get into the ‘Lycra’ gear! ... just go for a walk …15 minutes out, from home, and 15 minutes back! As you get used to this, you will end up walking faster and cover even more distance during your 30 minutes walk!
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