The size of my engine is equal to the size of my fist. This engine is the most important muscles in the body. This is because it pumps blood and oxygen to all organs. It also receives some of the blood it pumps for the second to second activities within the body. The day this work stops is the end of my life, your life, our life.
Although we are not immortal being so definitely we’ll all die one day. This has informed some critical thinkers to conclude that life is short so live the life the way you want because you matter what, you will die. That’s factual but inaccurate; you may live longer if you take good care of yourself.
The heart is the engine of the human body which works like the engine of a car or motor. The heart beats around 100, 000 times and pumps up to 7,500 liters of blood everyday. The heart is the strongest muscle in your body but can break down from habitual risk factors like smoking, alcoholism, eating unhealthy diet or living under stress.
When you live healthy, the heart is able to have continuous supply of oxygen to work effectively (that’s making the muscle fibers to contract resulting in the motion of the body) like the car; continue supply of fuels which lead to combustion of fuel. This causes the pistons of the engine to move which causes the motion of the vehicle. This means that smoking, taking a lot of alcohol, salt ( Sodium), fats, and living under stress can weaken the heart and break it down. Like the car engine, when you overuse it, it breaks down.
The public health school at University of Harvard acronymised five warning signs of early heart failure as FACES.
Fatigue; that’s one easily becomes tired.
Activity limitation; unable to do their normal activities because they become easily tired and short of breath.
Congestion; fluids build up in the lungs which cause coughing, wheezing and breathing difficulty.
Edema/ankle swelling; This occurs when the heart does not have adequate pumping power to force the used blood back from the lower extremities. This results in fluid accumulation in the ankles, legs, thighs and abdomen, hence there’s rapid weight gain.
Shortness of breath; The fluids in the lungs make it difficult for the carbon dioxide in the used blood to be exchanged for fresh oxygen. This usually happens when one is lying down due to force of gravity that allows fluids from the below the lungs to travel up.
We can keep our heart healthy by eating nutritious diet like more fruits and vegetables, less salt (sodium), less fats, daily exercise like brisk walking, avoid smoking and alcohol, take adequate rest and sleep.
In addition to this, if you’re hypertensive, kindly take your anti hypertensive drugs and do the above, if you’re diabetic too, do the same.
As we celebrate World Heart Day every 29th September, let use our heart to connect to be aware of heart health to stay healthy and live long.
Let remind ourselves that life ends the day our engine breaks down to guide us in our daily activities. How we take care of our phones and cars, let do same to our engine of the body. Bye!
Credits;
1. https://world-heart-federation.org
Kwasi Omaro 