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How much will healthier living
decrease your heart risk?
By
Peter M. Abel, M.D.
Medical Director, Prevention Center for Cardiovascular Disease,
Director, Arrythmia Center
A visitor to this
page posed an interesting question: Can you quantify the
benefits you say will accrue from reducing heart health risks
like smoking, lack of exercise and a high-fat/high-cholesterol
diet?
As a matter of fact, we can. The
National Institutes of Health funded a study several years ago
that did just that.
According to their findings, published
in the New England Journal of Medicine, here's the degree to
which each of the assessed lifestyle changes, taken individually
would reduce your risk of a heart attack:
-
If you stop
smoking, you will reduce your heart attack risk 50 to 70
percent within five years, compared with current smokers
-
If you exercise
regularly, your heart attack risk is 45 percent lower than
those who lead sedentary lives
-
If you maintain
your ideal weight, you have a 35 to 55 percent lower heart
attack risk than those who are 20 percent or more overweight.
-
If you consume the
equivalent of one beer, one glass of wine or one highball a
day, your heart disease risk is 25 to 45 percent lower than
that of nondrinkers. (Excessive alcohol consumption, however,
increases your heart disease risk).
-
If you are a
woman, postmenopausal estrogen replacement therapy will lower
your risk 44 percent, compared with nonusers. (There are, as
yet, no figures for combined estrogen-progestin therapy).
-
For each one
percent reduction in your blood cholesterol levels, your heart
attack risk decreases two to three percent. (With diet
therapy, the average cholesterol level reduction is 10
percent, and can often exceed 20 percent with diet and
medication).
-
Each one-point (I
mm Hg) decrease in your diastolic blood pressure produces a
two to three percent decline in heart disease risk. (With diet
and medication, the average decrease in diastolic pressure is
5 to 6 points, though decreases of 20 points or more are
frequently achieved.)
-
Taking one
low-dose aspirin tablet a day lowers your risk 33 percent,
compared with non-users. (These figures are for men.
Comparable large randomized trials of the benefits of this
therapy for women are still in progress.)
The Harvard and Dartmouth researchers
who conducted the NIH study were unable to establish a benefit
estimate for controlling diabetes, since the trials aimed at
determining them were still underway.
Keep in mind that these figures treat
each risk independently. The combined advantages of stopping
smoking, starting to exercise and losing weight would almost
certainly be significantly greater than the best individual
effect.
©1999 Cardiovascular Institute of
the South
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