We live in a world where we are bombarded with opposing messages. Turn on the television and just watch a thirty-second commercial. You’ll need an hour to figure out why the advertisers chose their messages to make us want to buy their product. It can be confusing for the viewer. One thing that can no longer be misunderstood is that smoking cigarettes will lead to cardiovascular problems. We still hear some people say that if you cut down or only smoke at a certain time of day that you’ll be alright. This just isn’t true. To further beat this subject over your head here are some reasons that cigarettes are terrible for your cardiovascular health:

1. Smoking increases your chances of coronary disease. The United States Surgeon General has called cigarette smoking the leading cause of preventable deaths and diseases. This fact could and should stand alone when someone thinks about starting smoking or quitting smoking. It has also been discovered that smoking poses a greater risk in people under fifty years old than over.

2. Smoking creates a windfall effect. Smoking will decrease your good cholesterol. This is bad news if you have any other bad habits or risk factors in addition to smoking. Poor diet, family history of heart disease and little exercise are a few examples that if mixed with smoking create a veritable pressure cooker in your body.

3. There is no good news about smoking. Further studies show that women who smoke and take oral contraceptives greatly increase their risk for stroke. Inhaling cigarette smoke severely affects the cerebrovascular system making it one of the most damaging risk factors for stroke.

4. To reiterate: secondhand smoke is still bad. Conservative estimates indicate that up to 70,000 preventable deaths each occur with people who have inhaled secondhand smoke. It’s hard to imagine that there are still some parts of the country that allow people to smoke indoors. Even provincial cities like Boston and New York have only, just recently, banned smoking in bars.

5. Cigars and pipes aren’t good alternatives. Some people that just because you don’t inhale smoke as much when smoking a cigar or out of a pipe that you’re home free when it comes to coronary disease. The study doesn’t back this up. While you may be “safer” than a cigarette smoker, the risk of coronary disease is greater in cigar and pipe smokers than non-smokers.

By-line:
This post was contributed by Heather Johnson, who writes on the subject of Nursing Salary. She invites your feedback at heatherjohnson2323 at gmail dot com.

Patients were given a list of possible heart attack symptoms, with 15 correct answers and 6 incorrect answers randomly listed. When asked to choose the correct symptoms on this test, almost half of all patients scored a grade under 70.

Of course, people who suffer from heart disease are five to seven times more likely to have a heart attack than people without coronary health problems. How is it that the average heart patient knows so little about his/her condition?

This is a widespread problem, unfortunately, amongst both heart patients and healthy patients. This is why people should become more involved with health advocacy, as ignorance is rampant where the subject is concerned.

The problem isn’t relegated to one area of the world, it seems, as this was an international medical study. Those polled included 3,522 patients from the United States, Australia and New Zealand. The complete study is available here.

This post was contributed by Heather Johnson, who is an industry critic on the subject of lpn to rn degree. She invites your feedback at heatherjohnson2323 at gmail dot com.