India Today – October 08, 2018

50 INDIA TODAY OCTOBER 8, 2018

HEALTH | WORLD HEART DAY

Pump up

your playlist.

Yo g a m u s i c

at bedtime

sets your

heart singing,

literally, apart

from calming

anxiety in

heart patients

(European

Society of

Cardiology,

August 2018)

Good news

coee zealots:

drinking 3-4

cups a day can

keep diabetes,

heart disease

and stroke at

bay, making

you live longer

(European

Society of

Cardiology,

August 2017)

Did you know
hot water
baths and
saunas lower
sugar levels
in the body,
chances of
heart problems
and stroke?
Recommended
for seniors
(JAMA Intern
Med, April
2015)

“HOW WELL DO YOU KNOW

YOURSELF? AND WHAT DOES

‘KNOW YOURSELF’ HAVE TO DO

WITH YOUR HEALTH? A LOT”

Dr NARESH TREHAN

Cardiovascular surgeon,

CMD, Medanta: The Medicity, Gurgaon

K

nowing your body, how it works, and

the environment you live in are the key

to being proactive about your health.

There are three things one has to work out.

First, know your genes. They will tell you about

your chances of getting the three most common

and devastating diseases. If there is coronary

heart disease in either your mother or father,

you have double the chance of getting heart

disease: 20 per cent. If both parents have it,

then there is 30 per cent chance.

Then there is diabetes. If one parent has it,

children have 25 per cent chance of getting it. If

both parents do, chances go up to 50 per cent.

Cancer is the third risk. Some people inherit

gene faults that enhance their risk of develop-

ing particular types of cancers. BRCA genes

carry risks of breast and ovarian cancers to the

next generation, something Hollywood actor

Angelina Jolie has. Other inherited genes are

linked to other cancers; some gene faults can

increase the risk of more than one type of can-

cer. However, some people with a predisposing

genetic variation never get the disease while

others do, within the same family.

Second, understand your own body struc-

ture and how you treat it. There is a mismatch

today between the quality and quantity of food

we eat, our energy intake and output, especially

because of sedentary lifestyles. We need to bal-

ance that. You need to do three things for that:

reduce oil-based products, sugar and carbo-

hydrate and eat more fruits and vegetables,

keeping in mind the ultimate calories these

foods give your body. On an average, an adult

needs about 1,600 calories a day. To match that

consumption, you need 40 minutes of cardio-

vascular exercise—gym, walk, jog, swim—to

keep your circulation in good shape.

Third is the environment and how it can

create a huge amount of stress, leading to high

blood pressure and the thickening of arteries.

The best way to neutralise stress is through

yoga and pranayam. Asanas neutralise the

efect of sitting for long, stooping over com-

puters, waiting in trac for hours, keep your

body flexible, your bones healthy. Pranayam

gives higher quantity of oxygen to your brain

because you are taking a deep breath and

holding it, allowing 200 per cent oxygen to

your brain, which refreshes serotonin and

dopamine levels. A stress buster, you must do

that every 24 hours. It also cleans your lungs.

Along with it, avoid tobacco and alcohol in

excess: no more than 60 cc in 24 hours, no

more than four times a week. ■

“TRY TO CONTAIN DHUL AND

DHUAN (DUST AND SMOKE), THE

TWO CONTRIBUTORS TO AIR

POLLUTION, AT HOME, IN YOUR

NEIGHBOURHOOD OR OUTSIDE.

THAT’S THE ONLY WAY TO SAVE

YOURSELF”

DR ARVIND KUMAR

Pulmonologist and thoracic surgeon,

Chairman, Centre for Chest Surgery &

Lung Transplantation & Director, Institute of Ro-

botic Surgery, Sir Ganga Ram Hospital, New Delhi

I

ndia has the dubious distinction of being

the country with the highest number of

deaths due to air pollution, according to the

World Health Organization. Yet, most Indians

are unaware of the enormity of the problem.

Such is the level of air pollution in our country

that everyone in India can be called a smoker

now. Think about it: we have 52 newborn

smokers every minute. And every Delhiite has

smoked 10 cigarettes every day in the past year.

What can people do to save themselves?

We breathe 25,000 times a day, inhaling

10,000 litres of air on average every day, and

inhaling thousands of kilograms of toxins in

each breath. About 99.99 per cent of those

toxins come out, but a minuscule portion does

not. As we keep breathing, 25,000 times a

day, that tiny portion becomes a chunk, gets

deposited in our lungs, absorbed by body and

JUST WHAT THE DOCTOR ORDERED:

Look out for those little signs and flip the red flags