Diabetes and Heart Disease

Your risk is the same as a person without diabetes who has had one heart attack.

Therefore it is very important to minimize your other risk factors by getting plenty of exercise, keeping your weight normal, avoiding cholesterol and fatty foods (saturated fat), and maintaining normal blood pressure.

 Walking is good exercise and helps in all those areas and reduces stress.
Most important, in our opinion, is that you do not smoke. If you are already smoking, join a "quit smoking" support group.

These are available in most communities and health-care facilities. Nicotine skin patches also may help.

Many of the risk factors that cause heart disease can be reduced significantly with a healthy lifestyle, and this should be your goal with or without diabetes.

However, because you already have one risk factor for heart disease (diabetes), there is even more reason to reduce other risk factors.