Topics

• Hypertension
• Angina - Chest Pain
• Exercise

• Heart Attack
• General Questions
• Heart Problems

General Questions

1. What are the risk factors for heart attack?

      While a family history of heart disease is a risk factor for heart attack, there is very little one can do to reduce this inherited risk. Fortunately, most risk factors for heart disease are under our control. These risk factors are: tobacco smoke, high blood pressure, high blood cholesterol, physical inactivity, obesity and diabetes. All of these risk factors can be changed, treated or modified to reduce one's overall risk of developing heart disease.

Cigarette smoking tops the list of risk factors for heart disease and heart attack. There is such a significant correlation between cigarette smoking and heart disease that the Surgeon General has called it "the most important of the known modifiable risk factors for coronary heart disease in the United States."