Heart-Healthy Foods That You Should Include In Your Meals

Heart diseases are one of the most common reasons for deaths worldwide. No matter what your age is heart disease can cause anyone and can even lead to death. However, due to advancements in the healthcare industry, it’s possible to cure heart diseases via heart surgeries. Doctors use embolic protection devices TAVR during cardiovascular procedures to protect your brain from strokes.

It’s true that we have a cure but you can protect your heart from diseases just by adopting a healthy lifestyle. This must be not much difficult in front of open-heart surgery, right?

Exercise and diet play a big role in the health of your heart and body as well. Keep in mind that your heart is the core of your body if core doesn’t work right then your entire body will suffer. Thus, it’s imperative to adopt a healthy lifestyle as soon as possible. There is no room for the delay here, after all, it’s all about your life! Stress is also a major problem that increases the risk of heart diseases. However, in this busy era, it’s quite difficult to live without stress. Actually, stress does not become a part of everyone’s life. But, by adopting a good lifestyle, you can reduce the stress.

You must be wondering, what a healthy lifestyle is?

Actually, it’s not much difficult! A healthy lifestyle means proper sleep, regular workout, and healthy diet. It’s true that not all the diseases are preventable but by adopting healthy lifestyle coronary heart diseases, can be avoided. Do you know there are some food items that influence cholesterol levels, blood pressure, inflammation, and triglycerides, all of which are the major risk factors for heart disease? Thus, it’s imperative to focus on your diet!

Following are the heart-healthy food items that you should include in your meals to maximize your heart health:

Leafy Green Vegetables:

Green vegetables are very beneficial to our health. In fact, leafy green vegetables are the most important part of a healthy diet. These vegetables are low in calories and rich in vitamins, minerals, and fiber. Including leafy green vegetables in your diet offer you several benefits such as the reduced risk of heart disease, obesity, high blood pressure and boosts your immunity.

You can have kale, collard greens, and spinach as these are packed with great vitamins, minerals, and antioxidants. Also, these green leafy vegetables are a good source of vitamin K that improves cell functioning and maintain blood pressure.

Whole Grains:

Whole grains are the ultimate source of various nutrients such as fiber, protein, B vitamins, trace minerals (zinc, iron, magnesium, copper), and antioxidants. Including whole grains in your diet helps you to reduce the risk of obesity, diabetes, and heart diseases.

Barley, oats, wheat, rye, quinoa, brown rice, and buckwheat are the major examples of whole grains that you can include in your diet.

Berries:

Snacking is a major problem for everyone. It has the potential to spoil your entire diet cycle. Berries are the solution to that! Blackberries, raspberries, blueberries, and strawberries are jam-packed with so many nutrients that are beneficial for your heart.

Also, these are packed with antioxidants such as anthocyanins, which protect you against the inflammation and oxidative stress that are major risk factors for cardiac disease.

Best Exercises For Heart Patients

A healthy heart requires a healthy lifestyle. There are several heart patients in every corner of the world. No matter, you are a child or an adult; anyone can cause heart diseases. However, as the healthcare industry is evolving day by day, health diseases are curable in most cases. Even, doctors use cerebral protection devices to prevent the brain from strokes while heart surgeries.

Regular workout is one of the best ways to prevent yourself from heart diseases and make your heart healthy. Doctors also suggest heart patients include simple exercises in their daily routines. Exercises make your heart healthy by boosting blood flow.

Following are the best exercises that heart patients can include in their daily routine:

• Walking:

This is the simplest and best exercise for everyone. A brisk walk in the morning is very beneficial for health. It makes your mind fresh and helps in fighting many diseases such as high blood pressure, hypertension, sugar, obesity, cholesterol, and many more diseases. For seniors and heart patients, walking helps a lot in lowering blood pressure and reduce the risk of heart attack and other problems. Also, seniors love to roam in the park and across the neighborhood.

• Yoga:

Yoga is the best workout for your body as well as mind. It includes meditation, breathing, and physical activity. Yoga is great to strengthen your heart and mind. This helps in reducing stress, lowering blood pressure, and boosting blood circulation. Undoubtedly, this is wonderful for your heart and mind as it sharpens your concentration level and calms your entire nervous system.

• Zumba:

If you love to dance, then this is the best workout for you. Dance with workout benefits, what else one needs! During Zumba, your entire body will be an inactive state. It also increases cardio endurance and prevents you from several heart problems. You can also take low impact Zumba sessions if required. Overall, this will do wonder on your body.

• Cycling:

In this busy environment, most people prefer to ride motorbikes and cars. However, cycling is a great way to boost your heart health. Cycling works on your heart, blood vessels, and lungs. It improves your entire cardiovascular system. It’s a good decision to prefer a cycle to go near.

• Water Aerobics:

In comparison with other exercises, water aerobics is good to reduce stress levels and activate “happy hormones” of your body. Water aerobics lowers your blood pressure and improves blood circulation.

It’s true that heart diseases are curable. But, prevention is better than cure! So, it’s imperative to take care of your heart. Without any medications, you can prevent your heart from diseases and keep it healthy. You just need to make slight changes in your daily lifestyle. Including workout in your daily routine will help you a lot in fighting diseases. But, don’t forget to customize your diet too. A healthy heart requires a healthy diet. So, include green vegetables, fresh fruits, curd, milk, and other healthy food items into your meals and remove junk!