by Adai Goldberg

Created on: October 01, 2009   Last Updated: October 03, 2009

Every 34 seconds, a person dies of heart disease. It is the leading cause of death in the United States and other westernized countries. Clinical and statistical studies of the patient population have identified a variety of risk factors contributing to coronary artery disease and heart failure. Many of these risk factors can be controlled through lifestyle modification and others cannot. However, when those changeable risk factors are decreased, the chances of avoiding heart related illness and death are also decreased.

Three risk factors which cannot be avoided are: increasing age, male gender, and heredity. As we age, things tend to get a little slower and a little more calcified. This is also about cardiac function. Valves, coronary arteries, and cardiac electrical conduction all undergo changes as we progress in age, it is something that happens naturally. Being a male and heredity also contribute to these risks. For some reason, plaque within coronary arteries in men tends to clump as opposed to being distributed evenly. Knowing that these risk factors are unchangeable, should compel us not to "heap coals on the flame" as the saying goes.

As opposed to the unchangeable risk factors, there are several identifiable ones that can be changed. Smoking, high cholesterol, high blood pressure, physical inactivity, excessive weight, diabetes, stress, alcohol, diet and nutrition can all be modified through life style interventions.

Smoking

Many of us know people who smoke and point to older people who have smoked without problems. They don't want to believe that it is an issue underlying coronary artery disease because of what they see. Unfortunately, it is what they don't see that is the problem. Those elderly people who are well into their 80's and are still huffing and puffing on cigarettes, may not have heredity or some of the other issues, so it is fruitless to base the response of ones body on another's DNA. The fact is that smoking, decreases the oxygen supply to the heart being that the pollutants are directly inhaled into the lungs. The amount of available oxygen to be exchanged by returning blood is decreased which also increase the demand on the heart. The heart attempts to compensate with increased pressure and heart-rate as a result. The chemical reaction of the nicotine within the blood also causes the platelets to clump, thereby increasing the risk for clots. The so called relaxation derived from smoking does not compare to the harmful effects on

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