Achieving Your Heart Healthy Goals

Taking Care of Your Heart

At The Medical Center, we want you to take care of your heart — prevention, education, and talking with your doctor play an important role in your heart health.

Use Questions to Ask Your Doctor (PDF) to gather useful information about your risk factors, your cholesterol, and blood pressure. Then take advantage of the many educational classes and resources offered here at The Medical Center to achieve your heart healthy goals. By eating right, exercising, and quitting smoking, you can significantly reduce your risk for heart disease.

Know Your Numbers

Healthy men and women age 20 years and older should have a “fasting” cholesterol test, including total cholesterol, LDL, HDL and triglycerides, every 5 years or more often, depending on risk factors and medical history.

Cholesterol is a waxy substance made by the liver. It is also supplied in the diet through animal products, such as meats, poultry, fish, and dairy products. Too much cholesterol in the blood can lead to heart disease. Knowing your cholesterol numbers and living a healthy lifestyle can help reduce your risk of heart disease and stroke.

Get your cholesterol checked at your doctor’s office, or visit one of our free cholesterol community screenings. The community screening is a non-fasting, fingerstick to identify possible risk and is not a replacement for the fasting blood test done in a medical lab. Once you know your cholesterol numbers, join the education class that’s right for you: nutrition, exercise, and tobacco cessation.

The American Heart Association’s The Cholesterol Low Down is a national cholesterol awareness program to help you achieve and maintain your target cholesterol numbers.

Exercise Your Heart

Evidence suggests that even low- to moderate-intensity activities can have both short- and long-term benefits. If done daily, they can help lower your risk for heart disease.

If you’re planning to start a new exercise program, talk to your doctor. To learn more about the benefits of exercise and tips for starting an exercise program, visit the following approved web site.

• Exercise and Your Heart: A Guide to Physical Activity, from the National Institute of Health

Eat Right for Good Health

Nutrition is the foundation for good health, especially good heart health. At The Medical Center, we’ve developed a number of free nutrition classes specifically designed with your heart in mind — from learning the basics of good nutrition, to heart healthy shopping and cooking tips, to exploring nutrition-related complementary therapies for heart health, and more. If you need additional help, our dietitians are available for one-on-one consultations through your primary care physician.

Body Mass Index (BMI), a numerical value of your weight in relation to your height, is a good indicator of a healthy or unhealthy weight in adults. Click here to check your Body Mass Index (BMI). BMIs under 25 are considered healthy, while higher BMIs are associated with health risks, like heart disease and stroke.

Get Ready To Quit Smoking

Quitting smoking is one of the best things that you can do for your heart. Cigarette smokers are two-to-three times more likely to die from coronary heart disease than nonsmokers.

If you are a smoker, talk to your doctor about the latest stop-smoking medicines and tools to help you quit, then take advantage of the free resources and support available:

Are You Ready to Quit?

• Call 1-800-TRY-TO-STOP to speak with a trained quit expert who is fluent in English, Spanish, and other languages.
• Visit www.trytostop.org for information and support from an online community.
• Visit Quit Works, a collaborative program between you and your doctor.
• Visit the Tobacco Prevention and Control Program, a New Hampshire based program.
• Visit www.smokefree.gov, a National resource.