Managing Angina
Reduce your risk factors
There are risk factors that you have no control over such as your family history, your age or your gender. You can do nothing about these. However you can prevent your angina from getting worse by making changes to your life in areas that are known to increase the risk of developing coronary heart disease or making it worse.
Many of these risk factors are so-called lifestyle changes and should ideally involve the whole family, helping everyone to have healthier hearts in the future. Risk factors do not just add up, they multiply, so even tackling one at a time can reduce your risk significantly.
The key risk factors are:
Smoking
If you smoke, one of the most important things you can do for yourself is to stop. Smoking affects coronary heart disease in the following ways:
- Smoking roughens the lining of the blood vessels encouraging atheromas to form.
- Smoking makes your blood stickier. This increases the chance of clots forming that can cause heart attacks and stroke.
- Smoking increases blood pressure and speeds up your heart.
Thus, it is an important risk factor for angina and stopping smoking is particularly important. To find out how to get help to stop smoking go to "
Getting help to stop smoking".
Controlling and monitoring cholesterol level
Many people who have angina are found to have raised cholesterol levels.
For people who already have heart disease, have had a stroke or have diabetes, lowering the cholesterol as much as possible, even when it is not particularly high, with a healthy diet, exercise and cholesterol lowering drugs called statins can help to prevent further problems.
For more information on cholesterol and how to reduce your cholesterol levels go to "
Cholesterol and Angina".
Controlling and monitoring high blood pressure
Uncontrolled high blood pressure is an important risk factor in coronary heart disease, heart attacks and stroke.
Over the years high blood pressure slowly damages the blood vessels making them narrower and less flexible, so that the heart has to work harder to push blood through them. If the blood pressure remains high the heart is put under unnecessary strain and in time this will cause damage. Damage to the blood vessels makes it easier for clots to form and for fatty debris to build up and block blood vessels.
A blood pressure of up to 140/90mmHg is considered to be the ‘normal’ range. Readings above this level may need to be treated with drugs, although some lifestyle changes can also help reduce high blood pressure. To find out more visit "High Blood Pressure and Angina".
Taking enough exercise
The heart is a muscle and it needs to be exercised to keep it strong. The more unfit you become the more your angina can affect you and so people with angina are advised to exercise regularly, within the limitations of their angina.
This does not mean that you should try and work through pain and/or breathlessness. You should never be so out of breath that you can’t carry out a conversation. You should stop if you feel pain/severe breathlessness and use your GTN spray/tablets if necessary.
If you are unsure about how much exercise you can manage, or have unstable angina, it would be best to speak to your doctor about what exercise may suit you. For more information visit "
Exercise and Angina".
Controlling and monitoring diabetes mellitus
In diabetes, a lack of insulin disturbs the body’s ability to store or use sugar.
Diabetes is one of the major risk factors for heart disease and stroke - people who have diabetes are between 2 and 5 times more likely to develop heart disease and stroke than people who do not.
Uncontrolled diabetes contributes to damage to the blood vessels and the build up of fatty deposits in the arteries called atheroma. Thus, it is very important to properly control and monitor your diabetes - for more information visit "
Diabetes and Angina"
Eating a healthy varied diet
The general healthy eating message is to eat a variety of high fibre, low fat foods, with saturated fat replaced by unsaturated oils and five portions of fruit and vegetables per day. To do this, you should:
| Eat more: | Eat less: |
- Fibre (wholemeal bread/pasta/rice)
| - Saturated fat (animal fat/ meat products e.g. sausages and burgers)
|
- Fruit /vegetables /fruit juice /salad /beans
| - Full fat dairy products (butter/ cheese/ lard)
|
- Fish (especially oily fish)
| |
- Low fat alternatives for spreading and cooking
| |
- Replacing with oils such as olive, rapeseed and sunflower oil
| |
- Healthy options in take-away food and ready-made meals i.e. low fat and low salt
|
|
For more information on healthy eating, visit "Healthy Eating and Angina".
Controlling your weight
Losing weight is not always easy and needs support and encouragement from health professionals and family alike. Better eating habits in the family may prevent problems for them in later life.
Being overweight increases the work the heart has to do, increases blood pressure, leads to abnormal fats in the body and is associated with diabetes, gall bladder disease and some cancers. Controlling your weight involves finding a balance between the food and drink you take in and the energy you use up.
For more information on ways to lose weight visit "Weight Control and Angina"
Controlling alcohol intake
The recommended daily limit for people everyone, including those with coronary heart disease is:
Alcohol units:
| Units per week | Units per day |
Women: | 14 | 2 |
Men: | 21 | 3 |
One unit of alcohol is either:
Drinking heavily increases your blood pressure, affects your cholesterol level and can make you gain weight. Binge drinking is particularly harmful.
If you have a problem with the amount of alcohol you drink, speak to your doctor or contact Alcohol Focus Scotland (see the
Helpful Addresses section of Support Groups and Agencies for contact details).
Coping with stress
Many risk factors are related to the way we behave and live our lives. Not dealing with stress, being unable to relax fully and overworking (which is different from working hard) all have an effect on the way we behave.
For more information on controlling stress in your life visit "
Stress and Angina".
Last updated: 14/11/2007