It was a sunny September day in the Pacific Northwest, and Jeff Hale had just closed a $1.5 million deal. To celebrate, he was taking the afternoon off, relaxing on his patio lounge, and playing ball with his dog. That's when he began feeling compression high in his chest, some pain in his left shoulder, and an unsettling sense of dread. At 44, he was in relatively good shape, although 15 pounds overweight and under a lot of stress from work. At first, he thought it was an asthma attack and took a hit off his inhaler. But when that didn't help, he remembered an article hed read.
"There were two things from that article I recalled," he recounted to our reporter a few years ago. "One was that every heart attack is unique. My symptoms will be different from your symptoms. The other was, if you suspect you're having a heart attack, take an aspirin." Hale took two and drove himself to the hospital. He almost didn't make it. Doctors found blockages in three arteries and performed a triple bypass the next day. "They told me I'd saved my life," says Hale. "The aspirin thinned my blood, and the inhaler dilated my arteries."
Heart disease is the number one killer of men, claiming the lives of nearly 400,000 fathers, friends, brothers, and sons every year. Often, the difference between life and death is razor thinremembering to pop an aspirin, not delaying your trip to the E.R.
This week is National Men's Health Week, which was created by Congress in 1994 to raise the awareness of the health threats uniquely facing men. To commemorate, weve put together a list of the most popular ways to die as a man in America. Collectively, these diseases kill nearly one million of us annually. And, chances are, your lifestyle or genetic profile puts you at risk for at least one of them.
But, as Jeff Hale learned, our fates are not sealed. If you understand your risks, and learn how to negate them, you can outrun the reaper. Heres how:
STROKE
Why youre at risk:Each year, nearly 50,000 American men die of a stroke, according to the American Heart Association. I know what youre thinking: But those arereallyoldmen. But youre wrong. In fact, 1 in 14 stroke victims is younger than 45. As a neurologist I interviewed a few years ago told me: If you did MRI scans on a hundred 40-year-olds, youd see that a large number have already had a silent stroke. And thats scary because small, silent strokes often precede large, debilitating strokes.
What you can do about it:Keep your blood pressure at 120/80 or lower. Every 20-point increase in systolic BP (the top number) or every 10-point rise in diastolic BPdoublesyour risk of dying of a stroke, says Walter Kernan, M.D., an associate professor of medicine at Yale University. The good news: Simple lifestyle changes can dramatically reduce your risk.Assess your stroke risk right here,and learn how to turn the odds in your favor.
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