Dr. Willie T. Ong, an internist and cardiologist, shares simple and practical health tips for everyone. He is a Health Columnist and ABS-CBN Salamat Dok volunteer.
We are all saddened a couple of days ago by the sudden death of director Wenn Deramas. He died of heart attack at the age of 49.
Heart attack happens when the flow of oxygen-rich blood to a section of heart muscle suddenly becomes blocked and the heart can’t get oxygen. If blood flow isn’t restored quickly, the section of heart muscle begins to die. Heart muscle needs oxygen to survive.
Some of the possible causes of heart attack are as follows:
1.Not eating nutritious foods and abusing one’s body
There are those young people who always like to eat fatty foods, sweet foods and a lot of foods that contains high in cholesterol. Then, they are smoking and do not have enough sleep. Chances are, they got sick at young age like having a high blood pressure, diabetes and heart diseases.
2.Uses of drugs like shabu, cocaine and ecstacy
People as young as 20 had already problems with their heart because of drugs in their body. The effect of drugs in one’s body is the high blood pressure and may cause a blood clot in your body that can block the blood flow and the result is heart attack.
3. Too much exercise
We already heard athletes who suddenly collapsed and die. The athlete may have Athlete’s heart, a condition wherein the heart may enlarge because of too much exercise. The medical term for this is Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy. This is a rare condition but it happens.
4. Congenital heart disease
This is an “inborn” condition. There are people who are born with already diseases in their heart. Because of this, their heart will have an irregular heartbeat. Dr. Ong advised them to have a healthy lifestyle, that is, eat right food and don’t take drugs. He added: even if you are always exercising and physically fit, it is still advisable for you to see a doctor and have yourself check up.
According to Dr. Willie Ong, there is also what is called a broken heart syndrome. This is due to separating of two lovers being in love. So don’t hope for “forever”, it may cause your heart to be broken and later you will suffer from heart attack.
Source: Dr. Willie Ong
