How to Fight Heart Disease

While your susceptibility to heart disease is largely hereditary, there are many day to day activities that you can do to help your heart defend itself against heart disease. Many people do not realize that every day that they are healthy is a day that their heart could be in training to fight off heart disease, and as a result they do not treat their daily diet, exercise and behavior with the gravity that the threat of heart disease deserves. Fortunately, even if you are not very good at sticking to a serious exercise program, some minor changes to your daily routine will make a big difference for your heart's training regimen. Read on to learn how to fight disease.

Things You'll Need

• Walking or running shoes

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Instructions

• 1

  Run or walk at least 20 minutes each day. Cardiovascular exercise is not just a good way to lose weight, get fit and look good. It is also one of the best ways to increase your heart's endurance and improve its stamina so that it can effectively resist heart disease. It may help you to think of your daily activity as a training session for your heart rather than focusing on shorter term, appearance-based goals.

• 2

  Eat five servings of fruits and vegetables each day. As many of these fruits and vegetables should be fresh as possible, as they contain more active and vital nutrients that will help your heart and your body in general to stay healthy and disease resistant. Furthermore, many of the components in preservatives actually accelerate the aging process, which can bring on the threat of heart disease faster.

• 3

  Each fish at least twice a week. Fish are high in Omega-3 fatty acids, which have long been believed to be vital to young children's growth and development, but lately have also been linked to heart health. They also can help lower cholesterol, and are believed by many experts to inhibit the development of senile dementia, Alzheimer's and macular degeneration.

• 4

  Replace refined wheat with whole grains. Breakfast is a good place to start for this process. Many cereals are available in both whole grain and processed forms. Replace your regular cereal with a whole grain variety to start, then begin eating other whole grain foods like breads, crackers and even bagels.

• 5

  Avoid processed sugars, trans fats and artificial preservatives whenever possible. Traditional snack foods like snack cakes, cream-filled pastries and other high sugar foods that have little or no nutritional value have actually been shown to potentially increase your resting heart rate, raise your cholesterol level and decrease your resilience to heart disease.