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About one in every three deaths in the US is attributed to heart disease. The most common form of heart disease is coronary artery disease (CAD), which can lead to a heart attack.

Interestingly, more heart attacks and other cardiovascular events occur on Mondays than any other day of the week.1 This “Monday cardiac phenomenon” has been recognized for some time, and has long been believed to be related to work stress.

Many do not realize that the most common symptom of heart disease is sudden death from a heart attack. Oftentimes, there are no prior indications of a problem; signs like chest pain or shortness of breath, for example.

The good news is that heart disease, just like type 2 diabetes, is one of the easiest diseases to prevent and avoid,
but you must be proactive! Below I’ll discuss several important prevention strategies. Checking your susceptibility is also a good idea.

In a nutshell, in preventing cardiovascular disease and heart attacks, it is important to address
chronic inflammation in your body. Proper diet, exercise, sun exposure, and grounding to the earth are cornerstones of an anti-inflammatory lifestyle. Effective stress management is another important factor for keeping a heart attack at bay.

Links Between Stress and Heart Attack Revealed

Two recent studies shed light on the persistent link between stress and sudden heart attacks. In one, a group of German researchers found that as your stress level rises, so do your levels of disease-promoting white blood cells.2, 3, 4 Co-author Dr. Matthias Nahrendorf explains:

“High levels of white blood cells may lead to progression of atherosclerosis, plaque rupture and myocardial infarction. The latter implies that a part of the heart muscle, which pumps the blood with every beat, dies off.

This may cause heart failure, either right away if the infarct is large, or later on through maladaptive processes. The heart tries to compensate for the loss of contractile muscle tissue but over time this compensation leads to a larger heart, which is weaker.”

The other study, published in the online open-access journal
mBio5, 6 found yet another way for sudden stress, emotional shock, or overexertion, to trigger a heart attack.