Health Tips

Here’s a riddle:

I’m red but I’m not a strawberry

I’m a shape but I’m not a square

I’m part of your body but I’m not your mouth

I’m a suit in a deck of cards but I’m not a spade

I’m used to say ‘I love you’ but I’m not a diamond

Yes, it’s none other than the organ heart.

Not only our heart is a symbolic figure for love, but it’s also arguably the most important organ in our body. The heart never stops beating to sustain our biochemical machineries, so that we stay alive and healthily.

In conjunction with World Heart Day, let’s learn how we can better take care of our cardiovascular system.

Image credit: https://www.keckmedicine.org/4-types-of-heart-disease-and-how-to-help-prevent-them/

Adhere to your medical treatment 

We want to start off by saying that if you have one or more of the following medical conditions, you’re at a higher risk for heart-related diseases than people who are healthy:

• High blood pressure (clinically known as hypertension) — Epidemiological studies have shown that high blood pressure is a strong predictor for cardiovascular diseases. Good news is, it’s also known that if you reduce your blood pressure, the risk of getting cardiovascular disease is also reduced. Every person may have a different target blood pressure, but ideally it should be below 120/80 mmHg. The target may be more lenient if you’re of older age or have other medical conditions. Read more about medications for high blood pressure here.

• Diabetes — Individuals with pre-diabetes (or to put it simply, a ‘borderline’ diabetes), undiagnosed type 2 diabetes, and long-lasting type 2 diabetes are at high risk of cardiovascular diseases. The risk is especially higher in women.

• High blood cholesterol and triglycerides (clinically known as dyslipidaemia) — “Bad” blood lipids are the culprits to blocked blood vessels, caused by a process known as atherosclerosis. These can lead to cardiovascular events such as chest pain, heart attack or stroke. The most commonly prescribed medications for controlling blood cholesterol are statins.

A not-so-fun-fact: The four factors– high blood pressure, high blood lipids, raised blood glucose (diabetes) and high BMI – together accounted for 63% of cardiovascular deaths. Therefore, you have plenty of convincing reasons to adhere to your medical treatment for long-term illness, especially those mentioned above. It’s also common for doctors to prescribe antiplatelets (e.g. aspirin) and/or anticoagulants in these groups of high-risk individuals to prevent heart diseases. 

Unfortunately, it’s common to see non-compliance issues among patients with these conditions, because these medical conditions don’t kill you straight away if you skip your medications. Yet, they are ‘silent killers’ that slowly chip away at your cardiovascular health; by the time they have gotten severe enough to set off a full-blown heart attack, it’s probably too late.

Hence, always take your medications according to your doctor’s instruction, and attend your follow-up visit regularly. Your heart will thank you.

Take good care of your mental health

As we deepen our understanding about mental health, it’s no surprise to find that our physical and psychological health are deeply intertwined. Both acute stress (e.g. natural catastrophic disasters, acute outbursts of anger or grief, death of a spouse) as well as chronic stress (e.g. at work or within the family) increase the risk of a cardiovascular event.  The INTERHEART study has shown that a myriad of stressors, such as social isolation, stress at work or in family life, financial stress and depression is associated with increased risk for heart attack. 

Mental health is just as important as our physical health. It’s never too late or too excessive to take care of your mind. Read more about depression here and the benefits of seeing a therapist here.

Image credit to National Alliance on Mental Illness  

Maintain a healthy diet

It goes without saying that a healthy diet would do our health a lot of good, and that includes maintaining a healthy cardiovascular system. There are two types of diets which cardiovascular benefits have been studied:

• DASH diet (Dietary Advice to Stop Hypertension) is a diet similar to the Mediterranean diet, which consists of vegetables and fruits, low fat dairy products, whole grains, chicken, fish and nuts. It is low in salt, fat, meat, sweet and sodas. The DASH diet has been shown to reduce blood pressure.

• Keto diet, which is a diet low in carbohydrate (typically less than 20% of the daily calorie intake) and rich in fats or proteins. Keto diet has been shown to have favourable short term changes on body weight and blood lipid levels. We have written an article on keto diet here.

Nonetheless, since there’s a lack of studies on the long-term effect of keto diet, the adoption of keto diet for reducing cardiovascular diseases is not encouraged. The DASH diet is still the preferred diet choice for maintaining a healthy heart.

Image credit: University of Kentucky

Malaysia also comes up with #QuarterQuarterHalf (‘Suku-suku separuh’), a visual tool that shows the proportion of food groups that is recommended to be eaten during a meal in order to achieve a balanced and healthy diet.

Image credit: https://twitter.com/bhgpemakanankkm

Less alcohol

Alcohol intake is associated with cardiovascular risk. It’s advised that non-pregnant women and men to limit alcohol to 1 drink and 2 drinks per day, respectively.

Source: CPG Primary & Secondary Prevention of CVD 2017

Stay physically active

Physical activity is beneficial for health, especially your heart. In fact, regular physical activity effectively reduces the risk of cardiovascular disease and death in healthy individuals by 20–30%. Even for individuals who have just survived a cardiac event, physical activity is beneficial for preventing the next one. 

Remember: any amount of physical activity is better than none. You don’t have to sign up for a gym membership to reap the benefits of physical activity. In fact, here are the things you can do: 

Source: CPG Primary & Secondary Prevention of CVD 2017

Quit smoking

Smoking accounted for 33% of all deaths from cardiovascular disease and 20% of deaths from ischemic heart disease in persons ≥35 years old. The thing about smoking is that, if you have smoking AND another risk factor for cardiovascular disease (such as high blood pressure or diabetes), the risk is quadrupled (2x2) compared to those who smoke but don’t have any other diseases. Whereas for e-cigarette and shisha, the risk of health is still unknown. However, scientists think that e-cigarettes have the potential of causing negative impacts on cardiovascular health.

Quitting smoking can be tough, but there are several professional approaches available to make the journey easier, such as nicotine replacement therapy, behavior intervention and psychosocial support. If you’re interested in quitting smoking with the help of a healthcare professional, look for mQUIT centres in Malaysia. 

Keep a healthy body weight

We love our country and we do not condone fat shaming, but the truth must be spoken: Malaysia is the fattest country in Southeast Asia. In the 2019 National Health and Morbidity Survey (NHMS), 50.1 percent of our adult population were reported to be overweight (30.4 percent) or obese (19.7 percent). 

A plenty of scientific evidence has shown that a high body mass index (BMI) is associated with higher cardiovascular diseases and death, among many other medical conditions. For every 5kg/m² increase in BMI, you’re 30% - 40% more likely to die than those who have a healthier body weight. If you have a high BMI, not all hopes are lost — a  5 to 10% weight loss can improve your blood pressure, blood sugar level, blood lipid level and overall quality of life. 

With that being said, we encourage you to lose weight healthily. Don’t try on any extreme weight loss diet without consulting a healthcare professional or buy weight loss products that are not registered in Malaysia. Consult a registered dietician or nutritionist to create a weight loss plan that works best for you.

A word from DOC2US

If you have any questions related to cardiovascular diseases, you can consult our professional doctors and healthcare professionals on DOC2US. DOC2US is a mobile application that allows you to talk to a doctor or any healthcare professionals via text chat at any time and from anywhere. For better communication, you can even send our online doctor images or voice messages related to your medical inquiry.

Download DOC2US app on Apple App Store, Google Play Store and Huawei App Gallery; or use our web chat at https://web.doc2us.com/

Note: DOC2US is not for medical emergencies. In the event of urgent medical conditions, please call 999.

Disclaimer: As a service to our users and general public, DOC2US provides health education contents. Please note the date of last review or update on all articles. No content on this site, regardless of date, should ever be used as a substitute for direct medical advice from your doctor or other qualified clinician.

Specific references have been linked in its relevant part of the article. 

Cover image credit: Photo by Robina Weermeijer on Unsplash

Written by

Ms Joyce Toh