It's no secret that obesity, overweight, smoking and stress shorten a person’s life, and atherosclerotic plaques that appear as a result of leading an improper lifestyle are to blame.
Atherosclerosis is a vascular disease. Its essence is that on the inner wall of the arteries there are peculiar growths that increase with time and clog the lumen of the vessels. The movement of blood through such "channels" is difficult, and in a critical situation it can completely stop, then there will be a heart attack (ischemia) of the organ or part of the body that receives blood through this vessel. A situation may also be catastrophic when there is atherosclerosis of the extremities, and part of the thrombus comes off and clogs up important arteries, falling with a blood stream into the heart, lungs, or brain. Atherosclerosis is a systemic disease, it affects the entire body, disrupting the delivery of oxygen to tissues.
In order for a plaque to appear inside the vessel, a lot of time is required. The human body is structured in such a way that inside it there are not only factors that contribute to the deposition of fats, but also substances aimed at the destruction of these formations. In fact, arteriosclerosis of the arteries appears when there is an imbalance between the two counterbalanced systems.
All causes and risks of atherosclerosis can be divided into 3 groups, among them predisposing factors that contribute and also provoke. Let us dwell on each group.
The predisposing causes and risks of atherosclerosis are factors beyond our control:
- Age over 35 years.
- Male. Before hormonal changes during menopause, estrogens - sex hormones to some extent protect women from atherosclerosis. For this reason, in men, the disease occurs earlier and more often.
- Genetic predisposition. It is noticed that people with atherosclerosis have relatives with heart and vascular diseases.
- The psychological type of personality. It is proved that people with labile psyche (emotionally unstable) suffer from atherosclerosis more often.
The contributing causes and risks of atherosclerosis can be controlled to some extent by humans:
- Arterial hypertension not only accelerates the formation of plaques, but also worsens the course of the disease caused by atherosclerosis.
- Violations of lipid metabolism lead to the deposition of "excess" cholesterol on the damaged inner wall of the vessel, which becomes the basis for further "adhesion" of destroyed blood cells and fibrin filaments. In fact, this is a simplified plaque formation mechanism.
- Smoking. Bonding of platelets and deterioration of blood flow occurs under the influence of nicotine.
- Obesity increases the load on the heart muscle and worsens the properties of blood, this factor is often not taken seriously, but in vain.
- Metabolic disorders (carbohydrates) are observed in diabetes. This disease affects the vascular wall, creating favorable conditions for the occurrence of blood clots.
- A sedentary lifestyle in combination with other factors is one of the main enemies of blood vessels.
The provoking causes and risks of atherosclerosis are, first of all, smoking and stress. They have already been mentioned as contributing. However, in combination with an increase in cholesterol, precisely these 2 factors are the main “triggers” in the process of sclerotic plaque formation.
Due to the wide variety of reasons, the treatment and prevention of atherosclerosis become a long and painstaking process. Of course, there is a medical treatment, but its cost is high, because it needs to be treated for a long time. It is worth knowing that tablets will not have all of their positive effect if the other 2 conditions are not met - diet and moderate physical activity.
Of course, a person cannot change his biological age or gender, but he can do his best to change his lifestyle.