How crucial is it to keep your heart healthy? Your heart relentlessly pushes oxygen, fuel, hormones,

compounds, and essential cells to every part of your body.

What can cause your heart to fail? Poor diet. Lack of exercise. Smoking. To name a few of the factors within your control. Remember, cardiovascular disease (a term for all diseases affecting the heart and blood vessels) isn’t inevitable, no matter your age.

Please take a look at this GamePlan for Heart Health. It’ll just take a minute, and it’s crucial information for every human being.

What’s Your

Take Charge of

Your Health

1. Know Your Team’s History: Any heart disease among parents, siblings, grandparents? Tell your doctor, who can design an aggressive strategy to lower risk factors like high blood pressure and cholesterol.

2. Retire Your Cigarettes: Smoking is bad for everyone’s heart. It’s simply a fact. So simply don’t do it.

3. Don’t Get Blindsided: High cholesterol can be dangerous, with no apparent symptoms. If yours is too high, make lifestyle changes or talk with a physician about medications.

4. Win At Home: Establish an eating plan that includes healthy, nutritional foods. Cut down on junk and processed foods.

5. Stay at a Healthy Playing Weight: Carrying excess weight wreaks havoc on a healthy heart. Learn your optimum weight and strive to maintain it.

6. Walk It Off: Regular exercise is one of the best things you can do to establish and maintain heart health. You can start small, like a 10-minute walk. Not tomorrow. Today.

7. Come Through Under Pressure: High blood pressure can lead to coronary heart disease, among other issues. Stress, diet, weight, exercise, medication— all affect blood pressure. Consult with a physician to establish a low blood pressure lifestyle plan.

8. Have Fun Out There: Speaking of stress, there are many ways to reduce it, such as exercise or mind-body techniques. Seek out methods to see which work best for you.

9. Winning is in Your Blood: Blood sugar that is out of healthy balance will damage your heart. If diet and an exercise plan don’t correct it, speak with a physician about medications that can help.

10. Put your GamePlan in Action: Make an appointment with one of Hackensack Meridian Health’s physicians at 1-888-732-9355.