Newswise — Adults without known heart disease or diabetes can estimate their risk of having a heart attack or dying of heart disease within the next 10 years using the new Heart Disease Risk Calculator on MayoClinic.com (http://www.mayoclinic.com/invoke.cfm?id=CR00002).
How the Heart Disease Risk Calculator works
The Heart Disease Risk Calculator asks you for your age range, if you are female or male, smoker or nonsmoker, total cholesterol, HDL (good) cholesterol, systolic blood pressure (the top number) and whether or not you are taking blood-pressure medication. The calculator then scores your level of risk as a percentage, based on information gathered from the Framingham Heart Study, a 50-year heart research study conducted by the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute.
For example, if your risk level is 1 percent, it means that approximately one of 100 people with this level of risk will have a heart attack or die of heart disease within the next 10 years.
Reduce your risk of heart disease
MayoClinic.com provides the Heart Disease Risk Calculator to encourage people to take the following steps to prevent heart disease:
* Get regular medical checkups
* Control your blood pressure. A resting blood-pressure reading of 115/75 is the level at which your risk of heart problems increases
* Check your cholesterol every three to five years
* Don't smoke
* Exercise regularly
* Maintain a healthy weight
* Eat a variety of low-fat foods, emphasizing vegetables, fruits, grains and legumes
* Manage stress
The Heart Disease Risk Calculator can be found in the Heart Center on MayoClinic.com along with a slide show on the secret life of your heart, a heart quiz, a blueprint for understanding the leading killer -- heart disease -- and more information on heart-disease risk factors, screening and diagnostic testing.
MayoClinic.com empowers people to manage their health by providing useful, up-to-date information and tools that reflect the expertise and standard of excellence of the more than 2,000 physicians and scientists of Mayo Clinic. MayoClinic.com is owned by the Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research.
RSS