Contents:
- Medical Video: Arterial Plaque Removal - Heart and Vascular Services at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas
- What is plaque in blood vessels?
- Remove plaque in blood vessels
- Healthy lifestyle for blood vessel health
- 1. Eat healthy food
- 2. Regular exercise
- 3. Drink herbal tea
- 4. Stop smoking
Medical Video: Arterial Plaque Removal - Heart and Vascular Services at Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital Dallas
Stroke and heart attack are the effects of blocked blood vessels of the brain and heart. This clogging of blood vessels is nothing but a pile of plaques that makes blood vessels narrow, even to the point of being closed. When it's closed, there is no blood rich in oxygen and nutrients that can be delivered to the brain or heart. Therefore, maintaining the condition of blood vessels from this plaque stack is very important. So, how do you remove plaque in a blood vessel? Can plaques in blood vessels be removed with a healthy lifestyle?
What is plaque in blood vessels?
Plaque is a mixture of fat, calcium, cholesterol and other waste products from body cells (yellow in the picture above). This mixture can then be attached to the walls of the arteries, making the blood vessels clogged and narrow, even long closed. The condition of narrowing of blood vessels due to plaque is called atherosclerosis.
Actually, removing plaque that has accumulated in blood vessels is very difficult. Therefore, before more plaque is formed, it is better to keep it from forming more and more in the blood vessels.
Remove plaque in blood vessels
There are many steps to healthy life that you can do to maintain healthy blood vessels. However, actual lifestyle cannot directly erode the plaque that has already formed in your body.
To erode it, you still need certain medications prescribed by your doctor. Or even to remove blockages directly surgery is needed by inserting a special tube so that the plaque is lifted and the blood flow is smooth again.
Even so, that does not mean you can only surrender to these medical actions. A healthy lifestyle is also needed to help remove plaque.
Because, a healthy lifestyle can prevent plaque formation. That way, the possibility of increasing the plaque that is formed will get smaller, and the blood vessels will not become narrower. Very helpful, right?
Healthy lifestyle for blood vessel health
1. Eat healthy food
Diet has an important role in maintaining the health of your heart and blood vessels. With the right food, the risk of plaque formation will also decrease.
These are foods that you should choose or that should be avoided for the health of your blood vessels:
- Choose foods high in healthy fats (unsaturated fats). For example olive oil, fish oil, fish (for example salmon or tuna), avocados, and nuts.
- Reduce the amount of meat and food containing milk and derivative products. Even if you choose meat, choose meat that contains less fat (not using skin).
- Eat more vegetables. Because besides being low in fat, vegetables are also a source of fiber which is very necessary to reduce cholesterol levels.
- Reduce the amount of sugar. Sugar can be found in processed foods such as paint, ice cream, and sweet drinks. This drink or food is not filling, but only high in added sugar.
- Avoid foods containing trans fat. Foods that contain trans fats, for example, are all fried, instant packaging foods, paint, biscuits, and margarine.
2. Regular exercise
Being overweight and obesity is one of the main risk factors that trigger plaque buildup in blood vessels. Well, exercise can prevent someone from having too much weight so that it is far from a blood vessel problem.
Regular cardio exercise can strengthen the heart and help ward off the buildup of plaque. Some cardio sports you can do are:
- Jogging
- Cycling
- Run
- Swim
- Aerobics
To get maximum results, at least do cardio exercise 30-60 minutes a day 3-5 times a week.
3. Drink herbal tea
Drinking herbal teas such as green tea, black tea, ginger tea, is the right choice for the health of your heart and blood vessels.
A study shows that drinking 6 cups of one of the herbal teas namely rooibos tea every day, for 6 weeks can help reduce bad cholesterol or LDL.
Other research also shows that green tea can also help reduce LDL levels in the blood. By decreasing LDL levels, that means the risk of plaque formation will get smaller.
4. Stop smoking
As reported by Medical News Today, cigarettes are a major risk factor that makes blood vessels clogged. Cigarettes can directly damage arteries and can make fat deposits form faster in blood vessels.
That is why you have to abandon the smoking habit to clear blockages in blood vessels. Quitting smoking will also increase good cholesterol aka HDL while reducing the amount of bad cholesterol or LDL.
