Mind your tummy, mind your heart
By NRJ Ramos
For most, having a slender waistline is merely about looking good. New studies conducted, recently, however, prove that maintaining a shapely abdomen could actually also be beneficial in gauging your heart’s health. This we learned during the annual World Heart Day celebration held at the Cultural Center of the Philippines grounds in Manila.
Considered the most important advocacy event ever organized to increase awareness concerning the global threat that is heart disease and stroke, World Heart Day came, through the efforts of the World Heart Federation with the support of its 93 member-organizations worldwide including the Philippine Heart Association and leading pharmaceutical company Sanofi-Aventis.
Despite advances in medicine, heart disease is still the world’s largest killer with 17.5 million lives claimed globally every year. It is as such that finding better ways to combat this deadly malady has become even more vital.
Maintaining healthy levels of blood sugar, cholesterol and blood pressure can help greatly reduce the risk of having heart disease. Then again, so is having a well-proportioned tummy.
According to Sanofi-Adventis medical director, Dr. Alma Casareo, the relationship between abdominal obesity (as measured by waist circumference) and heart disease had long been known in the medical world, it is just that some doctors are given to usually identifying only what is largely considered “classic” heart disease risk factors which include elevated blood sugar levels, elevated cholesterol levels, elevated blood pressure levels and vices such as smoking.
“International survey findings show that some doctors are not treating the many factors that put patients at increased risk in having heart disease equally. This year’s World Heart Day fête is meant to remind everyone to take heed of other emerging factors typically missed during their regular checkup including abdominal obesity.”
Abdominal obesity, explained Dr. Casareo, is highly prevalent worldwide. “Various studies have shown that abdominal obesity is a better indicator for intra-abdominal adiposity. They have found out as well that intra-abdominal adiposity, the hidden fat present deep within the abdomen, is a more accurate factor in identifying adverse cardiovascular risk than general obesity.”
More than that, however, Dr. Casareo lauds how easy abdominal obesity could be measured. “One needs only to measure their waist circumference with the use of an ordinary measuring tape. In the Philippines, a high-risk waistline is more than 80 cm for women and 90 cm for men,” she said.
For a complete cardio-metabolic risk assessment, however, Dr. Casareo recommends that we use the five-point health check.
“The five-point health check includes the identification and assessment of a whole cluster of cardio-metabolic risk factors including checking if you have too much LDL or bad cholesterol and not enough HDL or good cholesterol; checking your blood sugar; checking your blood pressure; checking for blood fat; and lastly, measuring fat around the waist.”
Nevertheless, Dr. Casareo still believes than an ounce of prevention is better than a pound of cure.
“Watch what you eat. Add more fruits and vegetable to your diet and eat less red meat. Of course, smoking is very much a no-no. Exercising for at least 30 minutes a day is good enough but if you can do better then do it. You’ve only got one heart, take good care of it.”
Obesity and Disease
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