Daily Health Tips: Trusted Medical Information, Health Tips and Advices

A stroke is an interruption of the blood supply to any part of the brain. A stroke is sometimes called a "brain attack." To help prevent a stroke: Avoid fatty foods. Follow a healthy, low-fat diet. Do not drink more than 1 to 2 alcoholic drinks a day. Exercise regularly: 30 minutes a day if you are not overweight; 60 - 90 minutes a day if you are overweight. Get your blood pressure checked every 1 - 2 years, especially if high blood pressure  runs in your family. Have your cholesterol checked. If you are at high risk for stroke, your LDL "bad" cholesterol should be lower than 100 mg/dL. Your doctor may recommend that you try to reduce your LDL cholesterol  to 70 mg/dL. Follow your doctor's treatment recommendations if you have high blood pressure, diabetes, high cholesterol, and heart disease. Quit smoking. Aspirin therapy (81mg a day or 100mg every other day) is recommended for stroke prevention in women under 65 as long as...

You know how you're always told to fill your plate with colorful fruits and vegetables? Count white as a color. It could cut your risk of stroke in half . When you think "white," think under the skin (e.g., apples and pears). Bananas, too. Also: cauliflower, onions, garlic, and cucumbers. In an impressive new stroke study, apples and pears were all-stars because they accounted for more than half of the white produce people ate, and the white stuff is what slashed stroke risk.    While eating lots of fruit and vegetables has long been linked to fewer strokes, this is the first effort to pinpoint which produce gets the credit. (Cut out this stroke-prevention list and stick it on your fridge.) An Apple a Day Keeps the Doc Away Keep that old rhyme in your head! The people in this big, long study (10 years, 20,000 men and women) cut their stroke risk 9% for every 25 grams of white produce they ate. Here's how apples size up (approximately) to some other...

Riddle: What could your credit card airline miles and your hard-earned vacation days possibly have in common with stopping a stroke? Answer: A strict "use it or lose it" policy applies to all three. Getting your brain cells into gear now can prevent a brain attack later. Strokes are so scary, most of us don't even want to think about them -- one big survey found you're three times more likely to worry about burglaries than this threat to your most important organ. (No, not that one. We mean your brain.) But a boatload of do-it-now recent research proves that knowledge = brain-saving power. Here's the stroke news YOU need to know: Little choices help you sidestep big brain trouble. Turns out that plenty of "no big deal" decisions are a big deal -- like moving your hand 2 inches to the left when picking out canned beans in the supermarket, so you grab the type not soaked in salt. Or ordering the broiled trout instead of the fried. Or hoppi...

Stroke Deaths Declining, but Stroke Is Still Third Leading Cause of Death A healthy lifestyle -- which includes not smoking, eating a low-fat diet with plenty of fruits and vegetables, exercising, and maintaining a healthy body weight -- may help prevent a first-time stroke. That's according to the American Heart Association, whose revised guidelines say such healthy behaviors reduce the risk for stroke by as much as 80%. In addition to a healthy lifestyle, authors of the guidelines say primary care visits and emergency room visits provide a major opportunity to intervene and reduce the risk of stroke. Emergency room physicians could identify people at risk, particularly patients with diabetes , asymptomatic high blood pressure , or atrial fibrillation, and make recommendations to help prevent a first-time stroke. "Stroke remains a major health care problem,"  "Its human and economic toll is staggering." The guidelines, last updated in 200...