Heart disease is a leading cause of death in the United States for both men and women. Most middle-aged and young adults have one or more risk factors for heart disease, such as diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, or being a smoker or overweight. Having multiple risk factors increases your risk for heart disease but you can do a lot to protect your heart and stay healthy. Heart-healthy living involves understanding your risk, making healthy choices, and taking steps to reduce your chances of getting heart disease.
By taking preventive measures, you can lower your risk of developing heart disease that could lead to a heart attack. You can also improve your overall health and well-being. Take action to protect your heart by following these tips.
Get Enough Quality Sleep
Lack of sleep or getting poor-quality sleep increases the risk of having high blood pressure, heart disease, and other medical conditions.
Eat Better
A flexible and balanced eating plan can help lower your high blood pressure and improve your cholesterol.
Maintain a Healthy Weight
Maintaining a healthy weight is important for overall health and can help you prevent and control many diseases and conditions.
Be More Active
Getting enough physical activity helps to lower your risk of heart disease and stroke.
Stop Smoking
Any amount of smoking, even light or occasional smoking, damages your heart and blood vessels.
Control Cholesterol
Unhealthy levels of cholesterol can lead to high cholesterol, which increases the risk of developing heart disease.
Manage Blood Sugar
Maintaining stable blood sugar levels is crucial for heart health, especially for people with diabetes or those at risk of developing diabetes.
Manage Stress
Learning how to manage stress with healthy coping strategies helps improve your emotional and physical health.
Control Blood Pressure
Keep your blood pressure in a healthy range and keep track of your numbers. Blood pressure that’s consistently higher than 130/80 mm Hg can cause serious health problems.
Practice Self-Care and Find Social Support
Daily acts of self-care can benefit your heart because self-care is heart care. Studies show that having positive social support, close relationships, and feeling connected to others makes it easier to stick to heart-healthy habits.
Studies show that if you join forces with people at home or online, you have a better chance of staying motivated. Best of all, you don’t have to make big changes all at once. Small steps can get you where you want to go. Gather your friends and family and make a commitment to your heart health, together.
Virgin Pulse1
For U.S. employees who are enrolled in a qualified Mauser medical plan, our Virgin Pulse initiative encourages employees to become, or stay, engaged in your own health by tracking your activity and rewarding you along your fitness journey. In addition to resources and tracking for exercise, Virgin Pulse offers a variety of tools to help you develop healthy habits in a variety of areas. These tools and resources can help you on your journey to establishing a heart healthy lifestyle.
Get started with Virgin Pulse today! The future is a choice and the best way to predict the one you want is to create it.
How to enroll:
- New participants can sign up at join.virginpulse.com/mauser
- Existing members can log in at https://app.member.virginpulse.com/welcome.html
- Download the Virgin Pulse mobile app for iOS and Android
- Start tracking your healthy activities and Journeys®
- Check-in by entering health measurements such as weight and blood pressure
- Participate in challenges with friends, discover healthy recipes, and more
- Get rewarded for the healthy things you do