Strong Heart Study - Arizona

Let’s meet Chi, the coatimundi! We can be heart healthy like him by spending good quality time with our loved ones.

Strong social connections with family and friends significantly improve heart health, reducing the risk of cardiovascular disease, heart attacks, and strokes by lowering stress and blood pressure. Positive relationships encourage healthier behaviors like regular exercise, better nutrition, and smoking cessation, while isolation is linked to higher risk.

Here is Heavenly, the Judum! 🐻 We can be heart healthy like him by getting enough sleep.

Getting enough quality sleep is essential for good heart and brain health. Sleep disorders make it difficult to get the sleep you need to stay healthy. In fact, they have been linked to a higher risk of cardiovascular diseases.
Research tells us how sleep disorders and poor sleep can hurt your heart health:
* Poor sleep can cause major cardiovascular disease risk factors including obesity, high blood pressure and diabetes.
* Insufficient or irregular sleep can negatively influence diet, stress and other lifestyle factors that can raise the risk of cardiovascular disease.
* Excessive daytime sleepiness, which is a symptom of many sleep disorders, including hypersomnia, can lead to a greater risk of cardiovascular disease.
* Sleep deprivation and sleep disorders have also been linked to increased inflammation in your body, which can also elevate your risk of cardiovascular issues.
* Poor sleep and sleep disorders can cause depression and other mental health issues, which can hurt your heart health

🐻 Judum means bear in the O’odham Language