As we age, maintaining good heart health becomes increasingly important. Unfortunately, many people over 60 have habits that negatively impact their cardiovascular health.
Identifying and changing these habits can go a long way toward reducing heart disease risk. It’s never too late to improve your heart health. Even making small lifestyle changes at 60 may lead to big benefits.
What Bad Habits Cause Heart Attack?
Smoking, sedentary living, chronic stress, poor sleep, and unhealthy eating patterns like eating too much inflammatory foods – these bad health habits cause heart attacks and cardiovascular events.
They trigger systemic inflammation plus biochemical reactions that alter blood flow while making arteries prone to plaquing and clotting. Breaking these patterns, even starting later in life, rapidly improves all metrics related to cardiovascular wellness – blood pressure, resting heart rate, arterial flexibility, cholesterol profiles, and more.
Now that we know what causes cardiovascular disorders, let’s see what the worst habits for heart health over 60 are.
Worst Habit for Heart Health Over 60: Science Says
One of the worst habits for heart health over 60 is smoking. Smoking is well-established as a major risk factor for heart disease and heart attacks. Quitting smoking, even later in life, can significantly improve heart health.
Another detrimental habit is a lack of exercise. Getting regular physical activity is essential for keeping the heart strong and preventing plaque buildup in arteries. Sitting too much is also bad for the ticker.
Without a doubt, smoking is one of the worst habits for heart health over 60. Smoking is linked to cardiovascular diseases like atherosclerosis, heart attacks, strokes, and other circulatory conditions.
The toxins in cigarette smoke damage blood vessels and cause inflammation throughout the body. This accelerates the buildup of fatty, atherosclerotic plaques that can block arteries.
Smoking forces the heart to work harder to pump blood through restricted vessels. This stresses the entire cardiovascular system. Individuals who smoke have a significantly higher risk of developing coronary artery disease, peripheral artery disease, aortic aneurysms, blood clots, and deep vein thrombosis.
Can you improve heart health at 60?
Absolutely! At 60 and beyond, improving heart health comes down to two things: stopping the worst habits for heart health over 60 and starting good ones. Kicking deeply ingrained habits can be tough, especially if someone has smoked, overeat, or been inactive for decades.
However, the body can respond to positive changes, even later in life. Within mere months of quitting cigarettes, eating nutritious foods, or starting an exercise plan, measures of cardiovascular function will start showing improvement.
Other Habits to Ditch for Better Heart Health
Supporting heart health over 60 requires rethinking habits around sleep, stress management, and social connection too. Running on too little sleep fuels chronic stress, which negatively affects the cardiovascular system via surges of hormones like cortisol and adrenaline.
Prioritizing restorative sleep every night lowers stress hormone levels. Finding positive outlets for managing stress – like meditation, therapy, journaling, or faithful friendship – also helps circumvent cardiovascular strain.
Lastly, having a strong support network is linked to better heart health outcomes. Social isolation and loneliness are tied to poorer cardiovascular function and control of risk factors like high cholesterol. Nurturing personal relationships and community connections seems to have protective benefits for the heart after 60.
When it comes to supporting heart health over 60, ending the 5 worst lifestyle habits is a smart strategy:
5 Worst Habits for Your Health
- Smoking: The most damaging, directly causes atherosclerotic disease
- Inactivity: Contributes to artery-clogging, clotting, inflammation, high blood pressure
- Poor diet: Drives up cholesterol, triglycerides fats, blood sugar and body weight
- Excess body fat: Burdens the cardiovascular system by releasing proteins that cause systemic inflammation
- Chronic unmanaged stress: Spikes blood pressure while also increasing clotting and inflammatory factors
Improving any one of these habits stands to enhance cardiovascular wellness. Yet addressing several or all simultaneously through a holistic lifestyle approach maximizes benefits. Even implementing small, gradual changes to these 5 areas adds up fast for lifesaving heart health gains past 60.
Conclusion
Protecting cardiovascular wellness must be a top priority after reaching 60 years old. Certain lifestyle habits jeopardize heart health and increase the likelihood of atherosclerotic disease, heart attacks, strokes, and peripheral artery dysfunction.
Smoking remains the single worst offender through its direct toxic assault on blood vessels and triggering of bodily inflammation. But inactivity, nutritionally vacant diets, excess weight, and unmanaged stress also inflict tremendous damage.
Even implementing small, gradual changes to long-time bad habits improves the odds of longevity free of cardiovascular disease. When it comes to safeguarding cardiovascular wellness for healthy aging, remember it’s truly never too late to ditch bad habits and cultivate new supportive ones. What small step will you take today to start optimizing your heart health?
References
- Bibbins-Domingo, K., Chertow, G. M., Coxon, P. G., Moran, A., Lightwood, J. M. … Goldman, L. (2010, February 18). Projected effect of dietary salt reductions on future cardiovascular disease. New England Journal of Medicine, 362, 590-599
http://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa0907355 - Pallazola, V. A., et al. (2019). A clinician’s guide to healthy eating for cardiovascular disease prevention.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6713921/
