Battling Heart and Stroke

The National Heart Lung and Blood Institute and MayoClinic list the following as the most common risk factors for hypertension:

• Older age
• Race or ethnicity
• Overweight or obesity
• Gender
• Stress
• Lack of physical activity
• Use of tobacco
• Family history of hypertension
• High alcohol consumption
• High sodium in the diet
• Low vitamin D levels
• Low potassium in the diet

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Instead of featuring a heart(y) celebrity this month, I would like to pay my respects to Tim Russert of NBC.

I was travelling around Western Europe when I heard of his unexpected death. Even here in the old continent, his name and face was known, especially among the English-speaking community. Russert was a respected political journalist whose opinion carried a lot of weight in the political scene.

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 Who said that life is always fair? The more you have, the less likely you are to die young. This is because those who have more money are less likely to suffer from stroke at an early age, according to a study by Dutch researchers recently published in the journal Stroke.

The study was part of the University of Michigan Health and Retirement Study and looked at 20,000 adults in the US. Their results show that the risk of early stroke is much lower among wealthy Americans between 54 and 65 years of age. However, as soon as a person reaches the age of 65, money doesn`t make a difference anymore - stroke risk is the same, rich or poor.

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