Health: How to Maintain a Strong Heart

Above all else, we need a strong heart with good pumping action to sustain us in our journey through the jagged lanes of life. A strong heart with good pumping action must have unclogged and flexible arteries. We need to ensure that our blood vessels are not clogged with undesirable plaque. This is to enable them to expand and contract allowing blood to be supplied adequately in proportion to the amount needed to parallel the activities we are pursuing. Otherwise we will be facing big problems with our hearts.

The United States spend more than $ 300 billion every year out of the United States economy on cardiovascular disease. Cardiovascular disease used to be a problem that requires only a heart bypass but today it is acknowledged that the problem is not that simple.

Research into plaque formation revealed a new astounding fact that gives a twist to the treatment of plaque building in the arteries. In May 2002 Scientific American published a major article that said that cardiovascular disease is not a straight plumbing problem. In fact our whole concept in this area was actually wrong. Dr Libby clearly states that inflammation is at the core of cardiovascular disease.

Our stress response causes inflammation, which is the immediate normal response of our immune system. When we are under stress, when facing an unreasonable and inconsiderate assault on our personality or the security of our status quo, we are driven to a fight or flight option. This response causes adrenaline to be released and with the release of adrenalin comes also an inflammatory response.

We use to hear that stress can kill us but used to be how. Now for we know for sure why stress kills us. With stress comes an inflammatory response. Inflammatory response is a factor responsible for plaque build up in our arteries leading to cardiovascular disease.

Another cause of inflammation is infection. Irrespective of where the infection occurs, the body release messenger molecules into the blood stream which come into contact with the arteries causing them to become irritated and inflamed.

Heart disease is not solely the problem of old people. Recently a 38-year-old movie star
died in an airport while waiting to board a flight to his home town. Autopsy showed that he had an arterial spasm that blocked the rest of the artery.

To reduce the possibility of a heart attack, we need to arrest plaque from building in our arteries. To ensure this we need a strong immune system so that infections are dealt with quickly and inflammation is controlled. We need to nutritionally support or blood vessels to keep them in flexible and effectively relaxed. Above all, do all that is necessary to ensure that our heart is pumping efficiently to maintain a good blood flow to meet the ever changing demands of our lives.