A Balanced Heart Is A Healthy Heart
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By Adesso Team | Posted Nov 18, 2022
Every year, heart disease kills more Americans than any other condition. In fact, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), one in every four deaths in the United States is caused by heart disease. And yet, despite its status as the leading cause of death, heart disease is largely preventable. So why isn’t the healthcare industry doing more to prevent it?
Are you living from the heart? Find out. Take our brief quiz to get your own #LiveFromTheHeart tip sheet.
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The answer, unfortunately, is money. The healthcare industry makes most of its money from treating sick patients, not from keeping them healthy. And so, preventive care has always been something of a secondary concern. That needs to change.
Heart disease develops over time as a result of lifestyle choices and other factors like genetics and age. Smoking, high blood pressure, diabetes, and obesity are all major risk factors for heart disease. And while you can’t do anything about your age or genetics, you can control your lifestyle choices.
That’s why preventive care is so important. You can dramatically reduce your risk of developing heart disease by making small changes to your lifestyle. For example, quitting smoking, eating healthier, and exercising more can all be beneficial for preventing heart disease. And yet, according to a recent report from the CDC, only 1 in 3 adults in the United States get the recommended amount of exercise each week.
The good news is that things are slowly starting to change. The Affordable Care Act (ACA), which was passed into law in 2010, requires insurance companies to provide coverage for preventive services like screenings and vaccinations with no out-of-pocket costs to patients. As a result of this provision, millions of Americans have been able to get the preventive care they need without having to worry about the cost.
The healthcare industry has a tremendous opportunity to prevent heart disease. Unfortunately, it’s an opportunity that it has so far failed to take advantage of. The good news is that things are slowly starting to change. With the ACA mandating coverage for preventive services and more people becoming aware of the importance of preventive care, hopefully, we will start seeing a decline in heart disease rates in the years to come.
