Skip to main content

Cardiovascular risks in people with long-term conditions

People with many long-term conditions are at increased risk of cardiovascular disease. If you or someone you care about is living with a long-term condition, here are some practical steps people can take to reduce their risk:

1. Attend for Scheduled Check-Ups: Make sure you attend for any scheduled check-ups. For example, to check your blood pressure, weight, blood sugar levels and cholesterol; or to review your medication.

2. Healthy Lifestyle Choices: Focus on a healthy diet, regular physical activity and avoiding smoking; all of which can reduce the risk of cardiovascular disease. For exercise, you should aim for at least 150 minutes of moderate intensity activity a week or 75 minutes of vigorous intensity activity a week. But even small changes – such as a modest increase in the amount of exercise you take each day – can have positive benefits. A diet rich in fruits, vegetables and whole grains and with less intake of processed foods and sugary drinks is also helpful for your health.

3. Medication Management: If you are prescribed drugs for conditions such as hypertension (high blood pressure) or diabetes, make sure to follow the treatment plan closely. Discuss any side effects or concerns with your doctor or another health professional.

4. Stay Informed: Understanding how your own health condition interacts with other diseases helps you stay informed about your health and reduce your risk of cardiovascular disease. This is an example of what health professionals call “health literacy”; which is increasingly important because of the greater focus in health systems on areas such as prevention and self-care.

5. Connect with Others: Joining a support group for people with your condition can provide valuable emotional support and practical advice from people who understand your challenges. These groups can be in-person or online. 

Finally, remember that this list is not comprehensive. Every individual has their own health needs and personal circumstances that will affect their health.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

What is the difference between primordial prevention and primary prevention?

Primordial prevention and primary prevention are both crucial strategies for promoting health, but they operate at different levels. Primordial prevention aims to address the root causes of health problems and improve the wider determinants of health. It focuses on preventing the emergence of risk factors in the first place by tackling the underlying social, economic, and environmental determinants of health. This involves broad, population-wide interventions such as: Policies that promote healthy food choices: Think about initiatives like taxing sugary drinks to discourage unhealthy consumption, or providing subsidies for fruits and vegetables to make them more accessible. Urban planning that prioritises well-being: This could include creating walkable neighborhoods with safe cycling routes, ensuring access to green spaces for recreation and relaxation, and designing communities that foster social connections. Social programs that address inequality: Initiatives aimed at reducing pov...
Post a Comment
Read more

UK Covid-19 Inquiry - The Importance of a Strong Primary Healthcare System

In my witness statement for Module 10 of the UK Covid-19 Inquiry, I discuss the pandemic's impact through from the perspectives of  primary care and public health, drawing on my extensive experience as a senior academic at Imperial College London and as a practising GP and NHS Public Health Specialist.  I emphasise that the pandemic disproportionately affected people who were clinically vulnerable, the disabled, ethnic minority communities and those living in deprived areas. The pandemic highlighted how structural inequalities, multigenerational housing, and employment in high-risk frontline roles exacerbated health disparities.  My statement also critiques the weakening of public health infrastructure - particularly for the control of infectious diseases - and the lack of integrated health data systems to identify at-risk groups such as the clinically vulnerable. I also advocated for a more robust preventive healthcare model that prioritises community-based primary care ...
Post a Comment
Read more

Relevance Over Recall: Rethinking How AI Uses Clinical Data

Our article in the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine argues that safe and effective AI in healthcare must incorporate mechanisms that emulate human judgement - down-weighting old, inaccurate or superseded information and prioritising what is recent, clinically relevant and reaffirmed - so that AI supports, rather than disrupts, high-quality patient care.  Clinicians constantly revise, reinterpret and filter past information so that only what is relevant, accurate and timely shapes present-day management decisions; medical records function as dynamic “working tools” rather than fixed archives. By contrast, many AI systems lack this capacity for selective forgetting and often treat all historical data as equally meaningful.  This can lead to outdated or low-confidence diagnoses being repeatedly resurfaced, persistent labels influencing clinical expectations, and irrelevant, long-resolved events cluttering summaries and decision-support outputs. Such indiscriminate recall...
Post a Comment
Read more