15-Minute Trick Slashes Heart Disease Risk

If you’re at risk for heart disease, you must add some exercise into your routine to significantly reduce your risk.

But you DON’T have to transform into a gym rat to reap those rewards, according to a new study.

Researchers uncovered a trick to slash your heart disease risk in as little as 15 minutes a day.

Everyday activities like doing the laundry, vacuuming, or mowing the lawn are great for your health because they get you off the couch.

And nothing can put you on the fast track to aging and disease more than inactivity.

But if you want to make a real dent in your heart disease risk, you’ll need to put a little more oomph into your exercise routine.

Researchers crunched data obtained from 88,000 middle-aged adults who wore activity trackers for seven years.

Overall, the folks who exercised the MOST—and at the highest INTENSITY—had the lowest risk of developing heart disease.

But it turns out intensity trumps duration when it comes to heart disease risk. For example, while a leisurely 30-minute daily stroll was not enough to cut heart disease risk, a brisk 15-minute walk every day WAS.

Even when moderate-activity people DOUBLED their amount of activity, if their intensity remained the same, they didn’t get any additional heart-protective benefits.

On the other hand, when vigorous exercising volunteers doubled their activity from 10 to 20 percent, their heart disease risk fell by 23 percent.

And the vigorous activity folks who increased their activity by 40 percent had their heart disease risk plummet by 40 percent.

The point is simply being active isn’t enough. You need to get your heart rate up to effectively drive down heart disease risk.

A forty percent increase might sound like a lot at first. But if you turn your brisk 15-minute daily walk into a 30-minute one, you’ve got it covered. And that’s something just about any one of us can work up to.

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SOURCE:

“Physical Activity Volume, Intensity and Incident Cardiovascular Disease,” European Heart Journal: 28 October 2022. DOI:10.1093/eurheartj/ehac613