Exercise - the antidote for cardiovascular diseases

Over the past decades, numerous scientific reports have examined the relationships between physical activity, physical fitness, and cardiovascular health. Together with high blood pressure, abnormal values for blood lipids, smoking, and obesity, a sedentary lifestyle is one of the 5 major risk factors for cardiovascular disease. The good news is you can actually do something about it. Regular exercise, especially aerobic exercise, can help you keep your heart healthy and also decreases the chance of having a heart attack or experiencing another cardiac event, such as a stroke, and reduces the possibility of needing a coronary revascularization procedure. ...

Aerobic exercises include walking, jogging, jumping rope, bicycling, skiing, skating, rowing, and aerobics or cardio classes.

Regular exercise has a favorable effect on many of the established risk factors for cardiovascular disease curbing its development by:

(1) Promoting weight reduction and helping reduce blood pressure.

(2) Reducing “bad” LDL cholesterol levels in the blood, as well as total cholesterol, and can raise the “good” HDL cholesterol

(3) In diabetic patients, it increases body’s ability to use insulin to control glucose levels in the blood

To achieve maximum benefits, you should gradually do aerobic exercise at least 20 to 30 minutes, three to four times a week. The try exercising every other day to help you start a regular aerobic exercise schedule. ...