
Pittsburgh Magazine: There’s Extra Risk to Your Heart Around the Holidays
Medical professionals say an increase in stress as well as poor diets and unhealthy alcohol consumption can lead to serious health problems this time of year.
It’s the most wonderful time of the year, but it also could be the worst for your health.
More people die from heart attacks between Christmas and New Year’s Eve than at any other time of the year.
According to Dr. Michael Bashline, a cardiologist at St. Clair Health, heart disease increases around the holidays, even leading to the term “holiday heart syndrome,” coined in the 1970s. Increased alcohol consumption plays a role, as does poor diet, lack of exercise and increased stress.
Holiday heart syndrome usually is found in otherwise healthy people and often younger people who would go into atrial fibrillation, which is an abnormal heart rate, which can increase your risk for stroke.
In addition to atrial fibrillation, heart failure exacerbation can occur in people who live with chronic heart failure.
“Patients with heart failure are very susceptible to changes in diet, increased salt, certainly alcohol plays a role in that as well,” Bashline says. “As we all know around the holiday season, we eat much differently than what we would eat on a day-to-day basis, whether it’s just a lot more sweets, a lot more [red meat], or just splurging much more on [the] kind of the holiday meals that we all think about.”
Bashline says people shouldn’t be afraid to enjoy the holidays but they should always keep moderation in mind.
“That doesn’t mean you can’t drink any alcohol around the holidays. It just means that I don’t think that this is an excuse to maybe drink a lot more than what you would usually drink or an unhealthy amount.
“Even with diet, I mean, everyone’s going to have some sweets around the holidays, that’s perfectly fine. And I wouldn’t tell my patient to never eat any candy or eat a piece of cake or eat dessert, because I’m going to do it myself.”
If you know you’re going to indulge in a big meal, maybe eat something smaller and healthier for another meal on that day, he suggests.
Stress, regardless of the time of the year, is a risk factor for heart attacks. During the holidays, there’s more stress as adults try to squeeze in cooking, shopping and making the time special for their families, Bashline says.
“The classic story is you get someone who maybe doesn’t exercise at all, and then they go outside and shovel the driveway, and then they have a heart attack. There’s actually a lot of truth to that,” he says.
Part of the reason is because cold weather causes narrowing of the blood vessels that go to the heart muscle, he says.
“So you have kind of, unfortunately, a lot of different factors all adding up at once around the holiday season,” he says.
He advises taking some time to focus on yourself and ask for help if you need it.
“I think it’s so very possible to do everything you want to do, but also kind of taking a step back and know that everybody needs to take care of themselves first in order to have a happy, healthy holiday season.”
Resource: https://www.pittsburghmagazine.com/bewell-holiday-heart-health/
First Published December 19, 2024, by Lauren Davidson.