27 Jul, 2010 in Health and Pharmacy News by admin

As Weight Goes Up, So Do Heart Risks


View Weight Gain Shockers Slideshow

Weight Gain Shockers Slideshow
View Weight Gain Shockers Slideshow

How Pets Improve Your Health Slideshow
View How Pets Improve Your Health Slideshow

Exercising With Your Dog Slideshow
Pictures of Exercising With Your Dog

By Dennis Thompson
HealthDay Reporter

FRIDAY, July 23 (HealthDay News) — People concerned about heart disease rightfully fret about their cholesterol, blood pressure as well as blood sugar levels, but there’s another overarching problem that could eclipse all those risk factors.

The nation’s obesity epidemic has put more as well as more people at risk for developing heart disease, both on its own as well as by exacerbating other risk factors, experts say.

“Obesity plays a role in almost all the coronary risk factors,” said Dr. Vincent Bufalino, president as well as essential executive of Midwest Heart Specialists, health examination director of Edward Heart Hospital in Naperville, Sick., as well as a spokesman for the American Heart Association.

Obesity can boost your levels of without money cholesterol, raise your blood pressure as well as increase your chances of acquiring diabetes, Bufalino said. In other words, obesity ties directly into the three biggest risk factors for heart disease.

Rising obesity rates as well as threaten to undermine progress that has been made in controlling those risk factors.

A study presented at the American Heart Association’s annual meeting reported that blood pressure as well as blood sugar levels continue to rise in adults, mainly fueled by increases in obesity. Those increases are such that they overwhelm improving heart-health trends, such as a drop in “bad” cholesterol levels as well as lower smoking rates.

As well as given the rise in childhood obesity, experts believe that things will only get worse. One of every three kids as well as teens in the United States is now obese, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control as well as Prevention. Those kids are more likely to develop heart disease later in life.

“The problem exists that the world is getting more as well as more obese,” said Dr. Gerald Fletcher, a cardiovascular healthcare professional with the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Fla. “Obesity is a major risk factor for heart disease, cancer as well as many other acquired diseases.”

The definition of obesity as well as overweight depends on body mass index, or BMI, an estimate of a person’s body overweight. People with a BMI of 30 to 39.9 are considered obese, according to the U.S. National Institutes of Health, as well as those with a BMI of 25 to 29.9 are considered overweight. A BMI of 40 or more indicates morbid obesity.

Doctors know that obesity plays a role in the three big risk factors, based on extensive research, but Bufalino said there’s common-sense proof available, too. People who lose weight as well as keep it off, he points out, always see across-the-board improvements in those risk factors.

“In all three categories — cholesterol, blood pressure as well as blood glucose — sustained weight loss will improve those numbers,” Bufalino said.

People who lose weight experience a decrease in their high blood pressure, as well as their levels of “bad” cholesterol (LDL, or low-density lipoprotein) drop, according to the American Heart Association. They as well as tend to experience an increase in “good” cholesterol (HDL, or high-density lipoprotein), which lowers risk for heart disease as well as stroke by helping cloudless the blood vessels of without money cholesterol.

Losing weight as well as is considered one of the best ways to bring diabetes under control, or to avoid it altogether incase a person has high blood sugar levels that indicate pre-diabetes.

People become obese by using in more calories than they can burn off over the course of a day, according to the American Heart Association. They compound the problem by eating foods rich in overweight, which contain more than twice the calories gram-for-gram of either protein or carbohydrates, as well as by eating foods loaded with sugar, which provides “empty” calories that possess no nutritional value but drastically affect the body’s blood glucose levels.

“People take care of their cars: They change the oil, they purchase recent tires,” Fletcher said. “But there’s only one body, as well as incase we don’t take care of it, we can’t expect the health-care system to do it for us. You can purchase another car, but you can’t purchase another body.”

The answer, then, is a clear one: To lower the chances that you’ll develop heart disease, you need to control your calorie intake as well as exercise regularly.

A wholesome diet involves watching everything you eat as well as counting the calories, Bufalino as well as Fletcher said. Common tips include:

  • Eat more vegetables as well as fruits.
  • Select leaner cuts of meat, as well as try to eat fish more often.
  • Choose whole-grain breads as well as pastas over those made with pale flour. The alike goes for copper rice over pale rice.
  • Incision out sugary cushioned drinks as well as fruit juices. Instead, drink water or diet beverages.

Dieting can help you lose weight, but you as well as need to exercise. “Reducing your calorie intake is what gets it started, as well as exercise provides the maintenance that keeps the weight off,” Bufalino said.

NIH experts recommend that people who are out of shape start off slowly, performing moderate exercise — walking for a half-hour three times a week, for instance — as well as then build up from there.

Wholesome weight loss is gradual, about one or two pounds a week, according to the CDC. Keep in mind that one pound equals about 3,500 calories, so to lose that pound in a week, each day you possess to burn 500 more calories than you take in.

Bufalino said he encourages people to lose 10 pounds in six months, which is an attainable goal that keeps them from becoming frustrated. They then can build on their success.

“If you can get a 10% weight loss, that’s a successful effort to control your weight problem,” he said. For example, someone who is 220 pounds should try to ultimately lose 22 pounds incase they want to see their heart-healthy numbers improve.

MedicalNewsCopyright © 2010 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

No Responses so far | Have Your Say!

Leave a Feedback

XHTML: You can use these tags: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>