The Spring Festival is a wonderful time for joyful and happy family reunion, however, cardiovascular health cannot be neglected in this lively festive atmosphere. As winter is originally a season for the high incidence of cardiovascular diseases, coupled with changes in peoples lifestyles and dietary habits during the Spring Festival, it further increases the risk of cardiovascular disease attacks.
So, why do cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases occur frequently during the Spring Festival? How can patients with cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases spend the Spring Festival safe and sound, and what are the precautions? In response to the problems, we interviewed Professor Zheng Yin, vice president of Hainan Chengmei Hospital and a well-known cardiovascular specialist in Hainan.
Professor Zheng Yin has been engaged in clinical, scientific research and prevention and healthcare of cardiovascular medicine and geriatric diseases for 35 years, who has deep accomplishment in terms of the prevention, diagnosis, treatment and health management of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases and geriatric diseases.
Why do cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases occur frequently during the Spring Festival?
Professor Zheng Yin explains, during the Spring Festival, there are many causes for the high incidence of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases, and there are mainly the following points:
Climatic factors
Temperature change: As the Spring Festival is in winter, the temperature is low and there is a large temperature difference between day and night. Low temperature will lead to vasoconstriction, causing elevated blood pressure and increasing the burden on the heart. Meanwhile, vasoconstriction will also narrow the lumen, increase blood viscosity, easily lead to thrombus, thereby causing cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases.
Weather change: In winter, there are complicated weather, such as wind, rain and snow and other bad weather, so the bodys stress reaction is enhanced, which causes changes in hormone level in the body, prompts blood pressure fluctuations, increases heart rate, thereby inducing cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases.
Lifestyle factors
Overeating: During the Spring Festival, people tend to binge on a lot of high-fat, high-cholesterol, high-salt food and alcoholic drinks, which will not only increase blood lipids and blood pressure, as well as blood viscosity, but also lead to blood sugar fluctuations and vascular endothelium damage, laying underlying groundwork for cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases.
Irregular sleep: During the Spring Festival, there are lots of parties and entertainment, as a result, people often stay up late and disrupt their normal biological clock, which makes the sympathetic nerves excited, raises blood pressure, increases oxygen consumption in the heart, so it can easily cause diseases such as arrhythmia, myocardial infarction, etc.
Less exercise: During the Spring Festival, people usually do less exercise, so the bodys metabolism slows down, with fat accumulation, leading to weight gain, which is detrimental to cardiovascular and cerebrovascular health.
Emotional factor
Stress and anxiety: During the Spring Festival, maybe people face family conflicts, economic pressure, work problems, etc, which will make the body in a state of stress and cause the body to produce too much hormones, such as adrenaline, causing blood pressure to rise and heart rate to increase, and increasing the risk of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease attacks.
Emotional fluctuation: The activities, such as visiting friends and relatives, gatherings and exchanges, tend to make people emotional, and excessive excitement or sadness will make the sympathetic nerves excited, so it makes blood pressure rise suddenly an cardiac load increase, thereby causing cardiovascular and cerebrovascular accidents.
Other factors
Air pollution: During the Spring Festival, there is a custom of setting off fireworks and firecrackers in some areas, which will increase pollutants in the air, thus reducing air quality. Harmful substances enter the body and affect the vascular endothelial function if patients are exposed to a polluted environment for a long time, which will promote the development of atherosclerosis and increase the incidence of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular disease attacks.
Medication interruption: Some patients with cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases may not take their medication on time during the Spring Festival due to negligence or inconvenience in traveling, which will lead to poor condition control and cause disease attacks.
In order to have a healthy and safe Spring Festival, we need to do well in the six aspects
1. Keep warm and protect against cold
During the Spring Festival, due to the low temperature, we should choose to travel or do outdoor exercise when the temperature is high from 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. When going outdoors, we should wear warm clothes, hats, scarves and gloves to protect our head, neck and hands, avoiding cold-induced disease attacks.
Meanwhile, we should pay close attention to climate change, as cold can increase the risk of heart attacks and heart failure, its important to keep an eye on weather change and wear more clothes, especially for the elderly.
2. Moderate diet
During the Spring Festival, we still need to follow the basic principle of “four less and four more” in the diet as a whole: Less salt, less oil, less fat meat and less sugar, more vegetables, more fruits, more lean meat and more grains. During the Spring Festival, it is recommended that we arrange more light dishes on the table, such as steamed fish, stewed chicken while increasing the proportion of fresh vegetables. Salt content should also be limited to 6 grams per day, for those with high blood pressure, its best to keep it below 5 grams per day. Eating fresh vegetables regularly is also good for lowering and stabilizing blood pressure. We should not only follow the principle of dietary nutritional balance to reasonably arrange diet, but also pay attention to timely replenishing the body with water.
Patients with cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases may have constipation or prostate enlargement, so excessive straining during defecation can increase myocardial oxygen consumption, which is very likely to cause angina pectoris and even acute myocardial infarction. Eat more vegetables and fruit rich in crude fiber, and eat coarse grains appropriately to make bowel movements smooth. Patients with prostatic hypertrophy should be treated in time, keep urine unblocked, and beware of acute myocardial infarction. Patients with diabetes need to properly control the intake of fruit, especially fruit with high glycemic index, such as banana, grape, watermelon, cantaloupe, jackfruit, candied fruit, etc.
3. Regular sleep
Keep a normal and good lifestyle, arrange activities according to regular routine, and the optimal sleep time for adults is 7 to 9 hours per day, during the Spring Festival, it is recommended that patients with coronary heart diseases increase their rest appropriately take a nap for half an hour at noon, which not only wont affect the festive atmosphere, but also can better restore energy. Avoid staying up late, sitting for a long time and playing cards, pay attention to moderate rest, and save physical strength.
4. Keep a calm mindset
Patients with cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases and the elderly should control their emotions and keep a calm and comfortable mind, avoiding sudden emotional aggravation. Patients can relax and enjoy the festive atmosphere by walking and listening to music.
5. Take medication on time as prescribed
In many cases, cardiovascular and cerebrovascular accidents are caused by a sudden increase in blood pressure, if you have high blood pressure, dont be “imprisoned” by our traditional thinking that it is unlucky to take medicine during the Spring Festival, at any time, please be sure to take medication strictly according to the doctors instructions on time, and do not discontinue, reduce or miss medication arbitrarily.
For example, the medications for patients with coronary heart diseases include antiplatelet drugs, antihypertensive drugs, antilipemic agents, etc, and sudden discontinuation of medication or failure to take medication on time may lead to fluctuations in blood pressure, and increase the risk of acute cardiovascular disease attacks.
Professor Zheng Yin suggests that patients prepare enough drugs before the Spring Festival holiday and take them on time. Especially for patients who need to take medication for a long period of time, emergency drugs such as quick-acting heart-saving pills and nitroglycerin can be prepared in advance in case of emergency. Please remember not to delay and call the 120 emergency number immediately if any family member has symptoms, such as chest tightness, chest pain, shortness of breath, headache, numbness in the limbs, etc. we can have the patient rest on his or her back and avoid moving or strenuous activity while waiting for the ambulance to arrive. We can give him sublingual nitroglycerin or relief pills. or quick-acting heart-saving pills if the patient has severe chest tightness.
6. Moderate drinking
During the Spring Festival, we cant help but have some drinks when our relatives and friends get together. However, alcohol will speed up the heart rate and may cause blood pressure to fluctuate dramatically, thus increasing the burden on the heart. Drinking can make certain hypoglycemic and antihypertensive drugs less effective, and alcohol can produce 7000 calories per gram, almost twice as much as general carbohydrates, easily leading to weight gain. More seriously, alcohol can delay the release of glucose from the liver into the bloodstream, potentially leading to severe and persistent hypoglycemia. The symptoms of hypoglycemia are sometimes extremely similar to those of drunkenness, which can be easily confused, delaying the treatment of hypoglycemia and causing serious consequences. Therefore, it is recommended that patients with coronary heart diseases and diabetes should avoid drinking as much as possible, especially for patients with oral hypoglycemic drugs.
In addition, its worth noting that antibiotics should not be taken indiscriminately if you have a history of drinking during the Spring Festival along with infectious diseases, such as pneumonia, thereby avoiding “disulfiram-like reaction”.
content is for health education purposes only
It is not intended for clinical diagnosis or medical advice
If there are any infringements or violations related to text or images
Please inform us promptly of the removal
Edited by | Huang Fei