Love Your Heart: Wear Red Today!
By Dr. Madelyn Fernstrom The annual Go Red for Women campaign is celebrating its 10 th Anniversary today! The “Go Red” outreach is one of my favorites – and a national call to action for women everywhere to take charge of our heart health. It seems hard to believe that nearly 80 million Americans have some type of cardiovascular disease. And each year, about 10% of these people die from heart-related illness. These 800,000 lives lost account for about one-third of all deaths in the United States. Scary numbers, but you can do something about it. It’s time to face your risk factors – if you haven’t done so already. The good news is that there are many ways to reduce your risk of heart disease, involving both medical and lifestyle care. That’s why “knowing your numbers” is so important. For your heart, these numbers include: -Total cholesterol -HDL cholesterol (good – think H for healthy) -LDL cholesterol (bad – think L for lousy) -Triglycerides -Glucose (blood sugar...