Maintaining the health of one’s heart shouldn’t be limited to only those who have a family history of heart disorders. Ensuring your heart is in fine condition every day should be a top priority for everyone to live a long and healthy life.
If you’re making a conscious effort to keep your heart health in check, take it a step further by making sure you’ve gotten rid of any unhealthy habits that may just sabotage your efforts! Keep your heart in tip-top condition by keeping these 4 missteps off your daily lifestyle routine and diet.
1. Insufficient or Lacking Diet
The two extremes of food intake, undereating and overeating, are both responsible for the poor health conditions of the heart. As such, it’s recommended to slowly but surely change your diet and eat foods that contain the proper amount of calories needed for your age, body composition, and sometimes your lifestyle.
Apart from taking in the right amount of calories, it’s also crucial not to forget about maintaining balance in your diet as well. Place emphasis on increasing your fruit and vegetable consumption so that you can have the vitamins needed to promote your heart health. If you find it hard to get these vitamins from everyday produce alone, you may want to consider introducing multivitamin & mineral supplements in your diet.
2. Smoking And Taking In Second-hand Smoke
It’s no secret that smoking and second-hand smoking is detrimental to your health. When it comes to heart health, smoking contributes to atherosclerosis (a disease characterised by the deposition of fatty material on the inner walls of the arteries) and increases your risk of having and dying from heart disease, heart attack, or heart failure. No matter what you do to improve your heart health, just as long as you continue to smoke or be around people that do, you will derive little to no benefits.
To promote the wellness of your heart, you’ll have to quit the habit and avoid being in the same area whenever those around you decided to light a cigarette. However, quitting a habit (or, in this case, addiction) is easier said than done. If you’re having difficulties, it’s advised to seek professional help or the aid of relevant support groups to curtail your cravings.
3. Keeping Pent-up Stress
The hustle and bustle of modern living typically develop into an eventual imbalance of your work-life balance. This occurrence of dedicating more hours to work and cutting them from your leisure time is certain to pile up your stress.
If left unchecked, the accumulated stress can increase your risk of heart disease. Thus, it’s crucial to keep your stress levels minimal and take some time for yourself after each workday and during the weekends to destress and relax.
4. Not Being Active Enough Throughout The Day
Working out and getting some exercise, even for at least 150 minutes every week, is the general recommendation of medical experts and online doctors in Singapore. If you’re not clocking in those hours, you will increase the risk of atherosclerosis. Moreover, a sedentary lifestyle may also develop into insulin resistance, which can cause type 2 diabetes and obesity, 2 risk factors of heart disease.
To mitigate the risk of these from happening, make sure to take a break every once in a while from work and stretch your legs to remain active throughout the day.
Conclusion
Apart from the issues covered above, ignoring symptoms that indicate that you may have heart problems is also detrimental to your wellbeing. If you ever symptoms such as chest pains and/or unexplainable discomfort in your arms, shoulders, or back, see a doctor online via the MyCLNQ app today. As the leading app for telehealth in Singapore, you can receive all the medical attention you need with a click of a button and receive further valuable advice on how to maintain your heart’s health.