Take the Healthy Heart Challenge – National Heart Foundation
What is the Healthy Heart Challenge?
We Challenge you!
https://healthyheartchallenge.goredforwomen.org.au/ehome/HHC/what-is-the-healthy-heart-challenge/
Heart disease is the No. 1 killer of Australian women. But it doesn’t have to be – you can do something about it
There is no single cause of heart disease, but there are risk factors that increase your chance of developing it. There are two different types of risk factors: lifestyle and clinical. Lifestyle risk factors include smoking, poor nutrition, physical inactivity and being overweight. Clinical risk factors include high blood pressure, diabetes and high cholesterol. Risk factors also include a family history of heart disease or heart attacks.
In Australia, 90% of women have one risk factor and 50% of women have two or three risk factors.2 The more risk factors, the greater the risk of heart disease.
But the good news is heart disease is largely preventable, because most risk factors can be managed or reduced. You just need to educate yourself, and the women you love, about heart disease and how to reduce your risk of developing it.
The 2012 Healthy Heart Challenge is here to help you do that.
Launched in 2011, the Challenge involves making simple changes to help reduce your risk of heart disease. It’s free and it runs for six weeks from 4 June until 15 July
Last year more than 17,000 women took part and of those surveyed afterwards:
- 82% were eating their recommended two serves of fruit every day
- 85% were eating their recommended five serves of vegetables every day
- 18% quit smoking
- 8% were able to stop taking their heart related medicine as advised by their doctor.
Many women think heart disease is only for older men to worry about, yet women are almost four times more likely to die of heart disease than breast cancer.1 There’s a lot more you should know about heart disease, including the risk factors and signs. Don’t let a heart attack be your first sign of heart disease. Take the Healthy Heart Challenge.How to sign up
The 2012 Healthy Heart Challenge runs from Monday 4 June to Sunday 15 July. The six week Challenge is free and you simply need to follow the steps below to register. Plus, if you complete your registration by 3 June you could win great prizes from our generous sponsors.
Choose a goal
Many women don’t know they have heart disease risk factors because they feel relatively fine. The Healthy Heart Challenge is about learning to understand your personal risk factors and how you can reduce them, before it is too late.
The Challenge focuses on four goals listed below – choose the one that inspires you to lead a healthier life:
- Lower high cholesterol levels
- Lower high blood pressure
- Be active every day
- Improve everyday nutrition
You can find out more about the goals here.
Register
Now that you’ve chosen a goal from the list above, you can register online here.
What’s next?
Once you’ve registered, you will receive an email from the Heart Foundation confirming your username and password for the Challenge.Use these details to log into the Healthy Heart Challenge website and access our healthy hints and tips and other useful information to help keep you motivated.You’ll also start to receive our Healthy Heart Challenge e-newsletters, letting you know what you need to do and giving you tips, information and recipes to help achieve your goal. You’ll also be prompted to track your progress online. This is a great way to make sure you stay on track and celebrate how far you’ve come.
Along the way you could also win a great range of prizes from our generous sponsors… just to help you stay motivated!
Encourage others
Make the Healthy Heart Challenge more fun and help yourself stay motivated by encouraging family, friends or colleagues to join as well. With Mother’s Day just around the corner, this could be the perfect mother/daughter activity – the gift that keeps on giving! Plus, as a gift for you, you could win a fantastic prize pack from our generous sponsors if a woman you care about joins the Challenge.
Looking for more information?If you have any questions about the Healthy Heart Challenge please feel free to contact our Health Information Service on 1300 36 27 87 (local charges apply) or via email onhealth@heartfoundation.org.au
Heartmoves New exciting program starting on May 11th at Virgin Active Health Club Frenchs Forest
A GREAT WAY OF GETTING BACK INTO EXERCISE
Most people know that regular physical activity is good for your health. But you don’t have to exercise at a vigorous level to achieve health benefits. To help, the Heart Foundation has developed a low-to-moderate intensity exercise program called Heartmoves, designed for people who are living with health conditions.
What is Heartmoves?
Heart Foundation Heartmoves is a gentle physical activity program suitable for anyone who hasn’t done any exercise in a while. You can exercise at your own pace in a friendly atmosphere.
Heartmoves is open to everyone and is designed to be safe for people with stable long term health conditions such as heart disease, diabetes or obesity.
Heartmoves is run by accredited exercise professionals specifically trained in managing safe, low to moderate intensity physical activity programs.
How Heartmoves can help you
Taking part in regular Heartmoves sessions can help:
- lower blood pressure
- improve cholesterol control
- manage weight
- improve well being and quality of life
- manage diabetes
- improve balance and flexibility
- improve sleep
- improve bone mineral density with arthritis management
- prevent falls and injuries from falls
Heartmoves for people with multiple sclerosis
Heart Foundation and MS Australia – ACT/NSW/VIC have joined forces to get people moving in safe and appropriate Heartmoves programs.
Heartmoves is a fun, social and safe exercise program that has been developed for people with stable long term health conditions such as heart disease, diabetes and bone or joint problems, as well as multiple sclerosis (MS).
The program focuses on delivering safe, low to moderate intensity exercise incorporating gentle aerobic activity, weight bearing or resistance exercise and stretching- all of which help to build strength and fitness as well as improve balance.
“Physical activity plays an important role in assisting to minimise the symptoms of MS which is why we are delighted to be working with the Heart Foundation to offer Heartmoves classes to people living with MS. Joining a Heartmoves class and participating regularly can make an important contribution not only to increased muscular strength and endurance but also toward reducing fatigue and stress levels” said Bill Younger, CEO MS Australia – ACT/NSW/VIC
“We are very excited to see Heartmoves being made available for people with MS” says Tony Thirlwell, Heart Foundation CEO – NSW. It is a fantastic program that can offer great benefits to people who may have previously felt worried about exercise.
Heartmoves aims to make exercise fun and social and for clients to enjoy themselves. There are always chairs available and the trained and accredited leaders can adapt the exercises to be undertaken in the chairs. Heartmoves leaders explain each exercise to participants and exercises are adapted for those with special needs
TO FIND OUT MORE
Contact Virgin Active Gym Frenchs Forest or Galy O’Connor via email: oconnor.galy@gmail.com
Julia Walter’s “BIG SHAVE”
On Monday March 26th, 10.30 Julia Walters is taking the plunge.
Julia is going to shave her hair off for a cause.
Julia is going to shave her head in support of the great work NSW Cancer Council is doing and to show support and solidarity to all those who suffer from cancer.
This is what Julie writes to us:
“Take a second to have a think about how many people you know have cancer…quite a few I am sure…now think of their families who are impacted by their cancer. Young children watching a sibling or a parent suffer through the treatment and pain and, at times losing them even after they thought the battle was won. This disease has to be stopped, we have to help finance research into its prevention and treatment and put an end to the misery it causes. I have been, as many of you also have been, touched by cancer, I lost my father and have witnessed many friends being torn apart both emotionally and physically as they battle through the treatment. I am a survivor myself. My campaign is not about me; it’s about you and your family, you and your friends. You can you help in many ways. One of them is to sponsor me as I shave my hair to identify with all those who lose their hair whilst in therapy… be part of helping to end to the misery that cancer causes.”
You can do so at:
http://nsw.cancercouncilfundraising.org.au/JuliaVirginShave
You can donate on the day … contact me or find Fiona Brown to do so…
March 26th, 9.30 a.m.
Wear Yellow the Color of NSW Cancer Council
Ovarian Cancer – Tessa sent us this article very important for all to be aware!
Miracle’ drugs put thousands at risk
Written in Sydney Morning Herald
Amy Corderoy
March 1, 2012
Miracle drug? … Simvastatin is the third most commonly prescribed statin in Australia. Photo: Bloomberg
THOUSANDS of Australians could be taken off cholesterol-lowering medications because of mounting evidence they increase the risk of diabetes and dementia.
Australian health authorities are reviewing their advice after US regulators announced statins will now carry warnings they could increase the risk of diabetes and cognitive impairment.
Statins are the most commonly prescribed drugs in Australia, with about 2 million people thought to be taking them to reduce their heart disease risk.
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The president of the Australasian Society for Clinical and Experimental Pharmacologists and Toxicologists, David Le Couteur, said Australia had one of the highest rates of statin use in the world, and people who were not at high risk of heart disease needed to reconsider using them.
He said doctors and other health practitioners should focus on lifestyle interventions for people with high cholesterol but without other risks such as previous heart attacks, high blood pressure and smoking.
Despite statins being linked to diabetes, he said people with the condition should still use them as diabetes itself put them at risk of heart disease. “If you have diabetes that’s even more reason to be on statins,” he said.
Statins have long been touted as a miracle drug, with some doctors and researchers pushing for their use in all older people. But Professor Le Couteur said that was unwise. “Unfortunately the history of medicine is chequered with hopes that have turned out to be dashed and even caused harm,” he said.
The evidence showing a link with cognitive impairment was not as strong as the links with diabetes, but if a patient developed symptoms he would consider taking them off the drugs.
But the director of the Baker IDI Heart and Diabetes Institute, Garry Jennings, said people should not stop taking statins.
“I hope that pretty much everyone who is on a statin in Australia is on it for a very good reason, although there might be a few lower-risk people on the fringe,” he said. “Statins work and there have been tens of thousands of people in trials … the overall benefit is clear.”
About 500 people would need to take statins for one new case of diabetes to develop, while a major cardiac event would be prevented for every 150 people taking them.
The national director of clinical issues for the Heart Foundation, Robert Grenfell, said he was more concerned by the number of people at high risk of heart disease who were not taking preventive medication. “We still have a high rate of morbidity and mortality from heart disease in this country,” he said.
A University of NSW professor of clinical pharmacology, Ric Day, said there was no doubt a lot of Australians had been prescribed statins when their total risk of heart disease was not high. “It’s a bit of a pity because you are taking a drug that doesn’t contribute much to your protection at all,” he said.
A study by the National Prescribing Service found the use of lipid-lowering drugs such as statins had increased from 4.8 per cent of people aged 45 and over in 1995, to more than 30 per cent.
The chief executive of the service, Lynn Weekes, said Australia’s high use of statins compared to the OECD indicated it was likely low-risk people were being treated. “If they are at low risk of heart disease you shouldn’t be putting them at risk for something else,” she said.
A spokeswoman for the Therapeutic Goods Administration said it was considering whether any action is required in Australia.
Are you TOFI – thin on the outside, fat on the inside?
You know those annoying people who never exercise but manage to stay trim and fit anyway? Well, you no longer have to hate them. (Okay you can still feel a little resentful). Turns out, many of those people could be risking heart disease and diabetes after all. In fact up to 45% of the women and 60% of men in this study were found to be harboring Secret Sneaky Fat around their vital organs, even though they had normal Body Mass Index scores. And unlike those of us who pack visible pounds when we misbehave, they didn’t even know that they were endangering their health.
[This MRI scan image provides a detailed look at where fat is stored internally in the human body. The image is of an average-sized man who is 6-foot-2, weighs 174 pounds and has a normal index of 21.7. Internal fat is shown as yellow, external fat is green and muscles are red.
This research comes courtesy of Jimmy Bell at the Imperial College, London, who has a nifty MRI machine that can create "fat maps" see where people are hiding fat that isn't visible just to look at them. ]
Bell said researchers even found these “TOFI’s” among professional models. He says those who are fat on the inside are in essence on the threshold of being obese. They eat too many fatty, sugary foods, and exercise too little to work it off.
As people go through their middle years, their proportion of fat to body weight tends to increase — more so in women than men. Extra pounds tend to park themselves around the midsection
At one time, we might have accepted these changes as an inevitable fact of aging. But we’ve now been put on notice that as our waistlines grow, so do our health risks. Abdominal, or visceral, fat is of particular concern because it’s a key player in a variety of health problems — much more so than subcutaneous fat, the kind you can grasp with your hand. Visceral fat, on the other hand, lies out of reach, deep within the abdominal cavity, where it pads the spaces between our abdominal organs.
Visceral fat has been linked to metabolic disturbances and increased risk for cardiovascular disease and type 2 diabetes. In women, it is also associated with breast cancer and the need for gallbladder surgery.
Fat accumulated in the lower body (the pear shape) is subcutaneous, while fat in the abdominal area (the apple shape) is largely visceral. Where fat ends up is influenced by several factors, including heredity and hormones. As the evidence against abdominal fat mounts, researchers and clinicians are trying to measure it, correlate it with health risks, and monitor changes that occur with age and overall weight gain or loss. .
The good news is that visceral fat yields fairly easily to exercise and diet, with benefits ranging from lower blood pressure to more favorable cholesterol levels. Subcutaneous fat located at the waist — the pinchable stuff — can be frustratingly difficult to budge, but in normal-weight people, it’s generally not considered as much of a health threat as visceral fat is.
Research suggests that fat cells — particularly abdominal fat cells — are biologically active. It’s appropriate to think of fat as an endocrine organ or gland, producing hormones and other substances that can profoundly affect our health. Although scientists are still deciphering the roles of individual hormones, it’s becoming clear that excess body fat, especially abdominal fat, disrupts the normal balance and functioning of these hormones.
Scientists are also learning that visceral fat pumps out immune system chemicals called cytokines — for example, tumor necrosis factor and interleukin-6 — that can increase the risk of cardiovascular disease. These and other biochemicals are thought to have deleterious effects on cells’ sensitivity to insulin, blood pressure, and blood clotting.
One reason excess visceral fat is so harmful could be its location near the portal vein, which carries blood from the intestinal area to the liver. Substances released by visceral fat, including free fatty acids, enter the portal vein and travel to the liver, where they can influence the production of blood lipids. Visceral fat is directly linked with higher total cholesterol and LDL (bad) cholesterol, lower HDL (good) cholesterol, and insulin resistance.
Insulin resistance means that your body’s muscle and liver cells don’t respond adequately to normal levels of insulin, the pancreatic hormone that carries glucose into the body’s cells. Glucose levels in the blood rise, heightening the risk for diabetes. Now for the good news
So what can we do about tubby tummies? A lot, it turns out. The starting point for bringing weight under control, in general, and combating abdominal fat, in particular, is regular moderate-intensity physical activity — at least 30 minutes per day (and perhaps up to 60 minutes per day) to control weight. Strength training (exercising with weights) may also help fight abdominal fat. Spot exercising, such as doing sit-ups, can tighten abdominal muscles, but it won’t get at visceral fat.
Diet is also important. Pay attention to portion size, and emphasize complex carbohydrates (fruits, vegetables, and whole grains) and lean protein over simple carbohydrates such as white bread, refined-grain pasta, and sugary drinks. Replacing saturated fats and trans fats with polyunsaturated fats can also help.
Scientists hope to develop drug treatments that target abdominal fat. For example, studies of the weight-loss medication sibutramine (Meridia), have shown that the drug’s greatest effects are on visceral fat. Rimonabant (Acomplia) — not yet FDA-approved — is the first of a new class of drugs that block a receptor in the brain that increases appetite. Acomplia has been shown to modestly reduce the accumulation of fat at the waist.
For now, experts stress that lifestyle, especially exercise, is the very best way to fight visceral fat.
How to measure if you have visceral fat:
To determine if you have a healthy waist to hip ratio, use a measuring tape to measure the circumference of your hips at the widest part of your buttocks. Then measure your waist at the smaller circumference of your natural waist, usually just above the belly button.
To determine the ratio, divide your waist measurement by your hip measurement.
Research shows that people with “apple-shaped” bodies (with more weight around the waist) face more health risks than those with “pear-shaped” bodies who carry more weight around the hips.
This test should be used as a guideline and is based on information found in The Section of Diabetes and Clinical Nutrition, University of Southern California School of Medicine, Los Angeles.
or
Go to:
http://www.healthcalculators.org/calculators/waist_hip.asp
| Waist to Hip Ratio Chart | ||
|---|---|---|
| Male | Female | Health Risk Based Solely on WHR |
| 0.95 or below | 0.80 or below | Low Risk |
| 0.96 to 1.0 | 0.81 to 0.85 | Moderate Risk |
| 1.0+ | 0.85+ | High Risk |
This with your weight, BMI and general well being will tell you a big part of the story…
TAKE CARE
Local Harvest – find local sources of food and grow your own
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A national directory for finding food co-ops, swap meets, community gardens, farmers markets, box systems, organic retailers and more by simply entering your postcode. |
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DIY alternatives for food production and meeting essential needs, including resources for growing and making your own. |
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Take up the Local Harvest Challenge, where for one week you attempt to reduce the ‘degrees of separation’ from your food. Based on the Household Action Challenge run in previous years. |
There is a fantastic similar resource existing for the USA found at www.localharvest.org on which this project has been based.
http://www.localharvest.org.au/
Lakanto Sugar – or is it SUGAR
LAKANTO-S
To buy ring J-Top Trade Australia
02 93172500
Sweetener with 0 calenergy, made from 100% natural materials.
LAKANTO is a sweetener prepared from two naturally occuring ingredients: an extract of the sweet Luo Han Guo fruit, traditionally used in China, and erythritol, sweetening component found in foods such as wine and mushrooms.
Almost all LAKANTO ingested is absorbed in the small intestine, however it is not metabolized in a human body. More than 90% is discharged as urine.
Consequently, LAKANTO is a delicious, calorie free sweetener which does not produce any energy in the body.
LAKANTO is a sweetener of naturally occurring materials prepared by an extract of “Luo Han Guo,” which is called god’s fruit in China, and “erythritol,” sweet-taste component contained in wine and mushrooms.
Almost all LAKANTO orally ingested is absorbed at the small intestine, but it is not metabolized in a human body but more than 90% are quickly discharged in urine.
Consequently, LAKANTO is a calorie free sweetener which does not produce any energy in the body.
Heat-resistant and not ruined by heat-cooking
Because LAKANTO provides excellent heat resistance, the taste is scarcely degraded by heating.
LAKANTO can be used in the same manner as sugar.
Good Taste like “Brown” Sugar
LAKANTO provides natural taste born from natural materials. It is a delicious sweetener strongly recommended to use every day in place of sugar.
Momordicae fructus Extract and Erythritol have No Effect on Blood Sugar Level and Insulin Secretion.
TRUE BEAUTY IN FITNESS…A MUST SEE
