Heart Health Archive

Using stretchy bands (known as exercise bands or resistance bands) can be a good way to ease into strength training. Pull-downs target the muscles of the middle and lower back and the front of the upper arms.

For people with depression, successful treatment with talk therapy may lower the risk for heart disease, perhaps by helping them adopt healthier habits, according to a 2023 study.

Swimming and water aerobics are joint-friendly forms of exercise that strengthen the cardiovascular system and muscles at the same time. A full-body exercise, swimming uses nearly every muscle in the body. Water aerobics includes exercises like jogging, jumping jacks, and twists done in waist-deep or higher water. The added resistance from moving in water also burns more calories compared with similar land-based exercise.

Pulmonary hypertension—a serious illness that affects the lungs and heart—has many possible causes, including a range of diseases and underlying conditions, as well genetic mutations and exposure to certain drugs. It is challenging to diagnose and treat, but a novel experimental drug that targets one form of the disease appears promising. The drug, called sotatercept, targets one of the dysregulated pathways that causes pulmonary arterial hypertension—one specific form of the disease.

A heart-healthy diet that focuses on plant-based foods is closely tied to improved physical fitness. In a 2023 study, higher healthy diet scores had an effect that was similar to taking an additional 4,000 steps per day.

Drinking coffee does not appear to increase the risk of heart rhythm problems, such as atrial fibrillation, in healthy people. It may temporarily raise blood pressure and the number of non-harmful skipped beats. While it may have other minor mixed positive and negative effects on other heart-related factors and behaviors (such as increased daily step counts, but decreased sleep duration and slightly higher LDL cholesterol), moderate coffee consumption appears to have no impact on the overall risk of cardiovascular disease.

Five smart watches capable of recording an electrocardiogram and detecting atrial fibrillation have been cleared for the market by the FDA. The devices can continuously monitor a person's pulse for an abnormally rapid heart rate and tell the wearer when to record an ECG, which involves opening an app and touching the side of the watch for 30 seconds. But it's not clear if using this feature can improve a person's health. There are many other ways to screen for afib. These strategies, which include simply checking one's pulse or wearing a heart monitor, depend on a person's afib risk and symptoms.

Lifestyle habits to prevent heart disease and strokes may also lower a person's risk for two other leading causes of death: cancer and dementia.

Wearing a device that automatically records blood pressure every 30 to 60 minutes for 24 hours (known as ambulatory blood pressure monitoring) may better predict death from cardiovascular disease and other causes than clinic blood pressure readings.

A calcium score, which quantifies the plaque inside the heart's arteries, can sometimes improve the ability to assess a person's risk of heart disease beyond the traditional heart disease risk score.