Assessing the risk factor is not very hard. You can self assess your risk factor without consulting your doctor. But it is observed that one cannot be as objective as required. In that case you can take help of your family doctor or your friend to assess the heart disease risk factor.
If you are above the age of 40 or someone in your family has a history of heart disease then you must do the risk factor assessment. Based on this assessment if you change your lifestyle then you can reduce your chances of getting heart disease.
When assessing your heart disease risk factor, most influential factors are your age, your gender, your blood-cholesterol level, percent of HDL cholesterol, lower and higher blood pressure, your habit like smoking and drinking. Prepare a worksheet that contains the information of all the above factors. This worksheet is just a guideline and shows you what is wrong and what type of habit increases your risk or decreases your risk factor for getting heart disease.
From the risk factor analysis you can change your lifestyle. Typical lifestyle changes include:
Changing your diet: Change your diet intelligently from high cholesterol food to low or heart-friendly food. It reduces your risk of heart diseases considerably. Your ideal diet must contain a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables. It also contains recipes with low amount of oils and other saturated fats. Try to avoid the junk food and deep fried food.
Stop smoking: If you are a smoker with high risk factor of heart disease then you have to quit the smoking if you want to reduce the risk of getting heart disease.
Reduce your weight: Your weight has a direct link with the heart disease. More the weight more your heart feels stress. Exercise regularly will help you to burn down the extra calories and reduce your risk of getting heart disease.
