This heart patient had some "bad luck":

This is a female patient, just 40 years old, who has been experiencing chest tightness and palpitations intermittently for the past week. In the doctor's opinion, women of this age group are almost unlikely to suffer from coronary heart disease due to the protection of estrogen . In addition, she does not have high blood pressure, diabetes, and does not smoke or drink. The doctor thinks that she does not need to be hospitalized for angiography, so he first screens her with a coronary artery CTA in the outpatient clinic.

But the result was unexpected: severe cardiovascular stenosis! The doctor quickly hospitalized her for cardiac angiography: the main blood vessels were 90% narrowed! A stent was implanted. The doctor analyzed the cause of her illness and found that although she did not smoke, she was a victim of secondhand smoke. Her husband and brother were both senior smokers. She also had a family history of heart disease, and her father had also had a stent. The patient said with certainty: This must have been passed down from my father!

The doctor said: Coronary heart disease is not hereditary! It just tends to cluster in families, and secondhand smoke is a big factor!

When it comes to preventing heart disease, there are many common but wrong ideas, such as the following three:

1. Coronary heart disease is hereditary

If parents have coronary heart disease, will their children also have it? Of course not! Although we often see coronary heart disease appearing in many families, it is not a genetic disease. It is the result of the combined effects of genes and bad habits, with acquired factors playing a dominant role.

In some families, some gene mutations may cause disorders in blood lipids, blood pressure or inflammatory factors, which indirectly increase the risk of coronary heart disease. However, a healthy lifestyle can inhibit the expression of these genes, delaying or preventing the occurrence of heart disease. This is equivalent to the fact that the seeds of coronary heart disease cannot take root and sprout without the soil of an unhealthy lifestyle. This is why longevity villages are more likely to appear in places with beautiful mountains and rivers and no competition with the world.

High-salt, high-fat, high-sugar diet, lack of exercise, obesity, long-term mental stress, smoking, and alcoholism will not only directly cause coronary heart disease, but also accelerate the expression of bad genes. If we can actively change these unhealthy lifestyles, it will not be a problem to reduce the risk of more than 50%.

2. Secondhand smoke is less harmful than smoking

Many people think that secondhand smoke is less harmful to the heart than smoking. This is wrong! A study in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology confirmed that exposure to secondhand smoke not only has a similar risk of developing coronary heart disease as active smoking, but also brings more additional harm!

The main reason tobacco causes heart disease is the damage to the cardiovascular endothelium caused by harmful substances such as nicotine and carbon monoxide. Secondhand smoke, like direct smoking, inhales these substances, but secondhand smoke contains more, 5 times more nicotine and 3 times more tar! Even if you are exposed to secondhand smoke for a short time, even 30 minutes, it may cause increased platelet viscosity, vasoconstriction, and increased blood pressure, thus inducing myocardial ischemia.

What is even more difficult to prevent is that once secondhand smoke combines with dust, it is difficult to remove in the indoor environment . It is adsorbed on the floor and furniture surface. Even if you open the window for ventilation or clean it, it cannot be completely removed. It can even exist for several months. It will always re-enter the human body through the respiratory tract and skin, causing "third-hand smoke" and causing a series of diseases such as lung cancer and asthma in addition to heart disease.

It is particularly important to note that secondhand smoke is very harmful to pregnant women, increasing the risk of miscarriage and premature birth, and affecting the development of children's intelligence and cognitive abilities. Therefore, whether it is to protect the health of yourself or your family, you should say "No" to secondhand smoke!

3. Eat less oil to lower blood lipids

When it comes to how patients with coronary heart disease should pay attention to their diet, everyone will say "eat light food and eat less oil", and even don't use oil when cooking. But surprisingly, some friends' blood lipids have risen instead of falling! What's going on?

Because the oil we eat can be divided into good and bad types, and eating less "good" oil may also increase blood lipids!

There are two types of oils that significantly increase blood lipids: one is saturated fatty acids, which are often found in animal oils, fat meat, liver and other offal. If consumed in excess and not enough exercise is done, it is easy to induce hyperlipidemia, fatty liver and a big belly. If we exercise enough, these saturated fatty acids can eventually be consumed slowly. But the other type of oil is difficult to remove once it enters the human body, that is, trans fatty acids, which are artificially synthesized oils with good taste and long shelf life. Therefore, they are widely used in food processing, such as hydrogenated vegetable oils, vegetable butter, margarine and so on in snacks. Once these trans fatty acids enter the human body, they cannot be completely removed for decades, even if exercise is intensified. They accumulate in the blood, causing hyperlipidemia, forming atherosclerosis on the blood vessel walls, and causing fatty liver in the liver.

Unsaturated fatty acids are good "oils". Not only do they not increase blood lipids, but they help lower blood cholesterol levels and reduce the risk of atherosclerosis, thus playing a role in preventing heart disease. Unsaturated fatty acids are commonly found in the vegetable oils we eat every day, such as olive oil, corn oil, sunflower oil, soybean oil, and some deep-sea fish. Therefore, it is not surprising that some friends do not even use oil when cooking, but instead cause blood lipids to rise instead of fall!

I am Dr. Zhang from the Department of Cardiology. If you like my popular science articles, please like them! You can also forward this article to share with friends in need! Follow me to see more health knowledge about heart disease!