Getting older – As a person gets older it is more likely that they will have heart disease. This is not surprising, since the growth of plaque in the heart can begin as early as the teenage years. As you get older, the plaque has had more time to grow, until it reaches critical mass, and begins to cause symptoms in the body including heart attacks.

If we look at the all the people of both genders who experience heart attacks, the numbers show that over 83% who will eventually succumb to heart disease are over 65 years of age. As we mentioned before, women tend to get heart attacks at a later stage in life than men, however when older women get heart attacks, they tend to be more fatal than in a man in the first few weeks after the attack.

Heredity – If either of your parents had/ has heart disease it is more likely that you will experience the problem than someone who lacks a family history of heart disease (CAD). Certain races have a higher rate of heart disease than others, including American Indians, African Americans, Asian Americans, and Hawaiians.

High Cholesterol – The higher the level of blood cholesterol in your body, the more likely that you will experience heart disease. Do not make the mistake of believing that high cholesterol causes heart disease. That hasn’t been proven yet. We do know there is a correlation between increasing blood cholesterol and heart disease. Your cholesterol levels are also controlled by other factors that include your sex, how old you are, what you eat, and your family’s history of cholesterol.

Do you smoke – If you smoke, you probable increase your chances of having heart disease by as much as 4 times over that of the non-smoker. When it comes to people that have heart attacks and are smokers at the time of the attack, it is twice as likely that the heart attack will be fatal. We also NOW KNOW that being in close physical proximity to a smoke significantly increases your chances of having heart disease.

Physically Active – If you are physically inactive, it is more likely that you will have heart disease. You could say that being physically active helps ward off heart disease. It is also significant that the more vigorous the exercise, the better off you are. Being active will also help you in controlling diabetes and its onslaught, lowering your blood pressure, and lowering risk of strokes. Walking an hour a day most days of the week will do wonders for your health.

High Blood Pressure – This is known as the silent killer. You never know the problems caused by high blood pressure until the problems are upon you. Think of blood pressure like a fire hose, put more pressure on the hose, and the hose will not last as long. In fact the life span of the fire hose will be degraded by more pressure. A heart operates under the same principle. The higher your blood pressure, the harder your heart has to work.

Now how about having high blood pressure and being physically inactive, and let’s smoke too. What do you think happens? You dramatically increase your chances of having heart disease. You are simply compounding the problem.

Overweight – the technical term is obesity. Statistics show if you carry a lot of weight, especially in the belly, you are dramatically increasing your potential for heart disease. It makes sense, if you carry a lot of weight around with you; your heart has to work harder than it would in a thin person. Carry the weight and your blood pressure is higher and all that it entails. Weight without question increases the potential for diabetes, and diabetes accelerates any and all heart disease processes. Even a minor loss of weight (10 pounds) has a direct effect on lowering heart disease potential.

Diabetes– People who have diabetes do not die from diabetes. They die from heart disease. If you have diabetes and you have confirmed heart disease, what you need to know is that diabetes takes heart disease to a quantum level. Since heart disease is a plaque growth process, the rate of plaque growth with people with heart disease is dramatically higher because of the diabetes.

If you have heart disease and diabetes, you must learn to control your blood sugar. You must see a qualified doctor who knows precisely how to deal with heart patients who are also afflicted with diabetes. There is hope, but that hope must be based on you acting.

Drinking too much booze – Alcohol raises blood pressure, and causes heart failure as well. Booze is a factor in cancer, and heart beat irregularities. Alcohol also hurts you in terms of causing weight gain (obesity), accidents, and alcoholism. Tests have also found that people who drink moderately, and the important word is moderately, experience less heart disease than those who do not drink at all. Moderate is defined as one drink for women per day, and two drinks for a man. If you do not drink at all, it is NOT recommended that you begin to do so for heart disease reasons.

Stress – It’s not really about stress, its about distress. Stress itself can be useful as in working intensely on something you love to do that involves a deadline. You may find it exhilarating. What we are speaking of here is distress which is persistent stress that is not resolved through coping or adaptation. Persistent stress is debilitating. It causes all kinds of negative reactions in the body, and it is now believed that it causes an increased level of heart disease.

For a fuller discussion of heart disease risk factors including what you can do to lessen your chances of developing heart disease even if you have one or more risk factors going against you, please take a look at our research report, which you can order by clicking below.