Exercises for a happy heart

February is all about love and love hearts and quiet fittingly, it’s also heart health month! The heart is the engine of the body and a healthy heart beats around 100,000 times a day, so it really does work hard to supply the body with oxygen-rich blood!!

Cardiovascular health

Cardiovascular health refers to the health of the heart and blood vessels. Cardiovascular diseases (CVD) are a group of conditions that affect the heart and blood vessels, including coronary heart disease, heart attacks, heart failure and stroke.

641,644 people are on registers for chest, heart and stroke conditions (including hypertension) in Northern Ireland. In the adult population about 1 in 5 people have a diagnosis of a chest, heart or stroke condition (about 290,000 people) and at least 1 in 4 people (about 380,000) are living with chest, heart and stroke conditions, maybe as many as 1 in 3 (about 470,000 people). Deaths due to chest, heart and stroke conditions, when combined, are the #1 cause of death in NI (NI Chest Heart & Stroke).

Exercises to boost your heart health

Exercise can play a key role in boosting heart health, helping to lower blood pressure, improve cholesterol levels, lower stress levels, boost better sleep and maintain a healthy weight, which in turn reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes.

For those with heart conditions or poor health heart, being active can help manage the symptoms and prevent conditions from getting worse. Even if you’re in good health, keeping up good habits like exercise and a healthy diet will help you in the long run!

I would highly recommend these types of exercises for a healthy heart:

Aerobic exercise: Walking, running, swimming, cycling, tennis and pickleball are great examples of aerobic exercises! So too are everyday tasks such as housework, gardening and washing the car. Any movement that leaves you feeling a little out of breath is considered a workout.

Resistance training: Resistance training is all about making your muscles work harder. You can do this with weights or bands, but you can also use your own body weight! As we age, our muscles lose strength, so resistance training is important to build strength.

Balance and flexibility exercises: Yoga, pilates and tai chi are brilliant for improving both flexibility and balance and overall this will help you with aerobic and resistance training. Other simple exercises to improve balance include walking sideways, heel-to-toe walk and the one-leg stand. Flexibility exercises help to ensure the muscles don’t get too tight, which ultimately helps you move easier and reduces the risk of injury and falls. Simple flexibility exercises include the calf stretch, hamstring stretch, overhead triceps stretch and knee to chest stretch.

Everyone with a heart or circulatory condition should try to be active, but you might need to adapt how hard you push yourself, depending on your condition and fitness level. I would advise anyone with a condition to speak to a health professional before taking on any new activities.

Yours in health

Andrea Nash is from the ABC Physical Activity Referral Scheme, which offers specialised exercise and activity programmes for people diagnosed with a variety of medical conditions such as cardiac disease, obesity, mental health and musculo-skeletal disorders, to name a few.