Managing Your Diabetes And Your Heart
We’ve talked about the link between high blood sugar levels and your heart health. But it’s not all down to blood sugars. Blood vessels are also damaged by high cholesterol and high blood pressure.
High cholesterol
If your cholesterol is too high, then the extra fat in your blood sticks to the walls of your blood vessels. Over time, this fat hardens and is known as plaque. Hard plaque can block up the blood vessels, which makes the space narrower and leaves less room for blood to flow.
This is called arteriosclerosis or atherosclerosis and is the most common cause of a heart attack.
In the narrower space, blood flow slows down and causes some of the blood cells to group together and clot. If a blood clot breaks away, it will travel through your arteries and veins until it reaches a section too narrow to pass through, making it partially or completely blocked.
This can starve the heart of oxygen and nutrients and this is what causes a heart attack.
High blood pressure
Not only does the blood struggle to flow through the blood vessels, but over time atherosclerosis makes the walls of your blood vessels more rigid and less elastic. This can lead to high blood pressure or make high blood pressure worse.
High blood pressure puts extra strain on your blood vessels too. Thats on top of the strain from high cholesterol and high blood sugar.
You can help prevent damage to your blood vessels by looking after your:
- blood sugar levels
Connection Between Diabetes And Heart Attack
Type 2 diabetes is a chronic condition that affects how the body processes blood sugar and causes high blood glucose levels. Over time, high blood sugar can damage your blood vessels and nerves. Untreated or uncontrolled diabetes can lead to many complications, including heart disease.
When you have diabetes, risk for heart disease or stroke is almost double that of someone without diabetes, and your risk tends to develop at a younger age.
Cardiovascular disease, including heart disease and stroke, is the leading cause of death in people with diabetes. In one systematic review , cardiovascular disease was linked to about half of all deaths of people with type 2 diabetes within a 10-year period.
- Less processed food, such as snack chips and sweets
When You Have Diabetes You’re More At Risk Of Heart Disease This Is Also Called Cardiovascular Disease Or Coronary Disease And Can Lead To Heart Attacks And Strokes
Cardiovascular disease affects your circulation too. And poor circulation makes other diabetes complications worse like problems with your eyes and feet.
Thats why its even more important to take good care of your heart when you have diabetes. Were here to explain why diabetes increases your risk of heart problems, and how you can reduce this risk.
Every week, we estimate, diabetes is a cause in over 590 heart attacks and 770 strokes in the UK
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Teen Years A Time To Prevent Diabetes Heart Attack
About 1 in 5 teenagers in the United States has obesity.
That is, they have a body mass index score — a measure of body fat based on height and weight and accounting for age and sex — that is higher than 95% of other teenagers of the same age, sex, and height.
The researchers tracked 12,300 teenagers who were part of the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health.
They determined the BMIs of the teens when they were 11 to 18 years old in 1994 and 1995, and then looked at health outcomes when the teens were 33 to 43 years old in 2016 and 2018 .
About half of the teenagers were female, and about two-thirds were non-Hispanic white. They had a mean BMI of 22.5 kg/m2, which indicates obesity in teenagers but is a normal BMI in adults.
Having obesity as a teenager was linked to greater odds of having high blood pressure, high cholesterol, asthma, cancer, kidney disease, sleep apnea, and premature heart failure, but not stroke — after adjusting for age, sex, race/ethnicity, education, income, smoking, and alcohol use.
âCompared to a teenager without obesity, a teenager with obesity is 2.73 times more likely to develop diabetes, 2.19 times more likely to have a premature heart attack, and 1.57 times more likely to report poor adult health,â Nagata says.
“In general, teenagers who have a higher BMI are more likely in adulthood to have a higher BMI, and that is associated with these risks, ” he says.
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Mayo Clinic Q And A: How Does Diabetes Affect The Heart
DEAR MAYO CLINIC: I am 42 and recently was diagnosed with diabetes. My doctor said I could manage the condition with diet and exercise for now but suggested I follow up with a cardiologist. As far as I know, my heart is fine. What is the connection between diabetes and heart health?
ANSWER: The number of people worldwide with diabetes is rising. While many may not realize it, having diabetes comes with a higher risk for heart disease.
Research has shown that people with Type 2 diabetes are up to four times more likely than the general population to die from cardiovascular causes. The fact that your health care professional recognizes the connection between these chronic, serious conditions is valuable. You can proactively take steps to reduce your future heart disease risk rather than only managing blood sugar levels.
Although you say that you do not have heart disease today, diabetes can damage blood vessels and make the heart muscle stiffer. This eventually leads to problems with fluid retention and heart failure.
After a heart attack, the heart muscle does not heal as well as in people who do not have diabetes. Also, the risk of complications, such as developing heart failure, is significantly higher.
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Diabetes And Coronary Heart Ailment
When youve got diabetes, you are extra vulnerable to a coronary heart ailment. This is likewise referred to as cardiovascular ailment or coronary ailment and might cause coronary heart assaults and strokes.Cardiovascular ailment impacts your move too. And terrible move makes different diabetes headaches worse like issues together along with your eyes and feet.
Thats why its even extra crucial to take correct care of your coronary heart if you have diabetes. Were right here to explain why diabetes will increase your danger of coronary heart issues and the way you could lessen this danger.
Every week diabetes reasons 530 coronary heart assaults and 680 strokes withinside the UK
Be Aware Take Control
Those affected by all types of diabetes are still at risk of developing heart disease, even if blood sugar levels are managed.
The most common form of heart disease is coronary artery disease, which develops over time as the arteries that supply blood to the heart fill with plaque. Plaque, which is made up of cholesterol and other substances, causes the arteries to harden. The medical term for this is atherosclerosis. When plaque continues to build, the arteries narrow, therefore reducing the flow of oxygen-rich blood to the heart. This causes the heart muscle to weaken, increasing the risk of heart disease, heart attacks, strokes, and even heart failure.
To hear more about the risks of heart disease, and questions from people just like you, visit: Ask the Experts: Medication Management for a Happy Heart.
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Prevention And Treatment Of A Silent Heart Attack
A silent heart attack is a potentially fatal condition, and preventative measures are very important. An electrocardiogram is often the first test to confirm a silent heart attack. The ECG test will be able to confirm a heart attack, or if one is in progress. Basically, an ECG detects electrical activity of the heart and the presence of any electrical abnormalities. Taking a personâs medical history and a physical stress test can also help detect a possible heart attack.
Other tests that help reveal heart disease conditions include an advanced cholesterol panel, a high-sensitivity C-reactive protein exam, carotid intimal medial thickness test, and an endoPAT test. Factors in a blood test can also reveal damage left by a heart attack, including increased homocysteine levels, high lipoprotein-A, elevated fasting blood sugar, insulin and A1c, low levels of vitamin D, high uric acid levels, low GGT, and high ferritin levels.
A coronary artery calcium-scoring test is a detection method that can be delayed until you are 50 or older, unless you suffer from a major risk factor of heart disease, such as diabetes.
Why Is There An Increased Rate Of Heart Disease
Diabetes can change the chemical makeup of some of the substances found in the blood and this can cause blood vessels to narrow or to clog up completely.
Maintaining fitness with regular physical activity combined with some weight loss can help reduce high blood pressure. Blood pressure lowering medications are often required for people who have diabetes.
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Why Does Diabetes Grow Your Danger Of Coronary Heart Ailment
If youve got excessive blood sugar degrees for a duration of time, even barely extreme, your blood vessels can begin to get broken, and this will cause acute coronary heart headaches.
This is because your frame cannot use all of this sugar properly, so extra of it sticks on your purple blood cells and builds upon your blood. This build-up can block and harm the vessels sporting blood to and out of your coronary heart, ravenous the coronary heart of oxygen and vitamins.
So preserving as near as viable on your goal HbA1c degree will assist shield your blood vessels and flip your coronary heart. Even mildly raised blood sugar degrees can, through the years, place you extra in danger.
Be withinside the recognize approximately your HbA1c and decrease it if it is too excessive.
The Link Between Diabetes And Silent Heart Attacks
One of the common complications of Type 2 diabetes is nerve damage, also known as neuropathy. This nerve damage is caused by elevated blood-sugar levels, and it can cause numbness, tingling, pain, sensitivity, and weaknessmost often in the feet or other limbs. In such cases its termed peripheral neuropathy.
However, neuropathy can also affect the autonomic nervous system, which controls the bodys heart and internal organs. Neuropathy can cause a loss of sensation to different parts of the bodynot only the feet and toes, but also potentially to organs such as the heart, Wong explains. This is sometimes termed cardiac autonomic dysfunction or autonomic neuropathy. The nerves of the autonomic nervous systems can be severely damaged. The result is that people will not necessarily feel chest pain, and this is one way that a silent heart attack is thought to be connected to diabetes, he says.
Its worth highlighting that people with Type 2 diabetes who experience peripheral neuropathy dont necessarily have the type of nerve damage that can hide a heart attack. Peripheral neuropathy is much more common than autonomic neuropathy, and theres not much concordance between the two, says Dr. Om Ganda, an associate professor of medicine at Harvard Medical School and a research investigator at the Harvard-affiliated Joslin Diabetes Center. So if you have symptoms of peripheral , that doesnt mean you must also have autonomic neuropathy.
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Explained: Why Is There A Sudden Increase In Heart Attack Among Young Adults
There is an alarming increase in the number of young adults aged 40 years or less, suffering from heart attack. This unprecedented increase in numbers is seen among both men and women. Heart attack occurs when there is sudden obstruction to the blood flow in the blood vessels supplying the heart muscles.
When the heart is unable to get the blood and oxygen it needs, it cant pump properly. The longer the heart goes without enough blood and oxygen, the greater the damage to the heart muscle.
Unsplash/Representational Image
How Is Cardiovascular Disease Detected
If your healthcare providers suspect cardiovascular disease, they will first look to your family health history for more information. Did your mother, father, brothers, or sisters have heart trouble? Your risk of developing cardiovascular disease is higher if you have family members with the disease. Other risk factors include bad cholesterol, obesity, and diabetes.
Healthcare providers use a variety of tests to detect cardiovascular disease. A routine blood test can show whether you have high levels of c-reactive protein. This is a marker that youre at higher risk. An electrocardiogram will show whether your hearts electrical activity is normal. If it’s not, a stress test on a treadmill, for example, will give more information that may lead to diagnosis. If you are not able to walk on a treadmill, your healthcare provider may “stress” your heart by injecting medicine through an IV. This medicine can cause the heart to beat fast and imitate the stress of exercise. Some people will be asked to have an echocardiogram. This makes pictures of the heart to show how well the muscles of the heart can squeeze and pump blood.
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How Would I Know I Had One
It can be a challenge. In some cases, you’ll get symptoms after the heart attack, including:
- Feeling very tired
- Heartburn that won’t go away
- Swelling in your legs
- Trouble breathing when you never had it before
Other times, it’s just chance that you find out you had a heart attack. You could go to your doctor months later and just happen to get some tests that show it.
Your doctor can do a few things to check for signs that you’ve had one, such as:
- Blood tests to look for certain proteins that your heart makes when it’s been damaged
- Electrocardiogram , which checks the electrical signals in your heart
- Echocardiogram, a type of ultrasound imaging that looks at the heart
Signs Of Nerve Damage
You can help protect yourself by keeping a close eye out for nerve damage. If you catch it early, you might be able to slow it down.
Here’s what you can look for:
- Feeling dizzy or fainting when you stand up
- Hard time doing even limited exercise
- Problems peeing, like having accidents
- Sexual problems, such as a low sex drive
- Sweating way more than usual or not at all
- Trouble digesting food, like bloating and stomach upset
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The Abcdes Of Diabetes Management
Ask your doctor about the ABCDEs to reduce your risk of heart attack and stroke:
A A1CMost people should aim for an A1C of seven per cent* or less by managing blood sugars well. A1C is a blood test that measures your average blood sugar level over the past 120 days.
B Blood pressureYour blood pressure should be less than 130/80* mmHg.
C CholesterolThe LDL cholesterol target is less than 2.0* mmol/L.
D Drugs to protect your heartSpeak with your health-care team about medication to protect against heart attack and stroke, such as blood pressure pills , cholesterol-lowering pills , Aspirin, Clopidogrel and others.
E Exercise & EatingRegular physical activity and a healthy diet can help you achieve and maintain a healthy body weight.*
S Screening for complicationsAsk your health-care team about tests for your heart, feet, kidneys, and eyes.
S Smoking cessationStop smoking or seek help to quit.
S Self management, stress, and other barriersSet goals for yourself to reach your targets and live well with diabetes, such as managing stress effectively.
*Discuss your target values with your health-care team. Note that A1C targets for pregnant women, older adults and children 12 years of age and under are different.
What Is A Heart
Heart-healthy foods help lower your risk of having heart disease in the future. They do this by reducing your blood pressure, overall cholesterol, LDL cholesterol, triglycerides, and fasting blood sugar.
They may also contain high levels of antioxidants. These protect against oxidative stress and inflammation, which contribute to the development of heart disease.
In general, heart-healthy means:
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Diabetes And Coronary Heart Assault
Here well explain what can appear on your frame to purpose those coronary heart headaches.
Lets begin with the essential blood vessels on your frame, and those are your:
arteries they create blood far from your coronary heartveins they make blood lower back on your coronary heart.If those arteries and veins get broken, it may be more challenging for blood to waft across the frame and get to the regions its needed.
Obesity And Belly Fat
Being overweight or having obesity can make it harder to manage your diabetes and raise your risk for many health problems, including heart disease and high blood pressure. If you are overweight, a healthy eating plan with fewer calories and more physical activity often will lower your blood glucose levels and reduce your need for medicines.
Excess belly fat around your waist, even if you are not overweight, can raise your chances of developing heart disease.
You have excess belly fat if your waist measures
- more than 40 inches and you are a man
- more than 35 inches and you are a woman
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Why Does Diabetes Increase Your Risk Of Heart Disease
If you have high blood sugar levels for a period of time, even slightly high, your blood vessels can start to get damaged and this can lead to serious heart complications.
This is because your body can’t use all of this sugar properly, so more of it sticks to your red blood cells and builds up in your blood. This build-up can block and damage the vessels carrying blood to and from your heart, starving the heart of oxygen and nutrients.
So keeping as close as possible to your target HbA1c level will help protect your blood vessels and in turn your heart. Even mildly raised blood sugar levels can, over time, put you more at risk.
Be in the know about your HbA1c and how to lower it if it’s too high.