If you have atrial fibrillation (AF) you are at greater risk of having a stroke.
DID YOU KNOW?
Nearly 80% of strokes in people with AF can be prevented.
The risk of developing a clot and having a stroke depends on a number of factors. The level of risk will determine what treatments are recommended and your doctor will discuss these treatments, including the benefits and risks, with you. For more information on AF and risk of stroke click here.
The good news is AF can be successfully managed with help from your doctor or nurse. Knowing about and properly managing your AF can lower your risk of having stroke and enable you to live a full and healthy life.
Medication
The risk of stroke can be dramatically reduced by taking medications called anticoagulants (blood thinners). There are two general classes of blood thinners that can be taken in tablet form: Warfarin and Novel Oral Anticoagulants. If you have AF, you need to talk to your doctor about whether or not to start taking blood thinners.
If you have been diagnosed with AF you should discuss your specific stroke risk and potential benefit from taking blood thinners with your doctors at your earliest convenience to ensure you are doing everything you can to reduce your risk of a stroke.
These medicines come with their own risks particularly an increased risk of bleeding and bruising.
Visit the section on how AF is treated for more information on blood thinning agents.
In addition to your medications, you can improve your health, better manage your AF and lower your risk of complications like stroke and heart failure by making some changes to your lifestyle.
In addition to your medications, you can improve your health, better manage your AF and lower your risk of complications like stroke and heart failure by making some changes to your lifestyle.
Exercise and AF
Exercise does not only help improve heart health, it also helps to lower the effects of stress and risk of depression and anxiety.
You may be concerned that exercise will raise your heart rate and trigger or worsen your AF. Although this may be true for some people, research suggests that regular exercise can result in people with AF feeling better and having fewer symptoms.
Talk to your doctor about exercise and how to recognise and manage AF symptoms when exercising.
Increasing your confidence when exercising
You should take small steps to building your confidence to exercise. You may only do five to 10 minutes of walking around the house, but if you can do this without a problem, look to increase this by a minute the next day and so on. Having a support person such as a family member or friend to exercise with can be a great confidence boost as well as motivator.
If you are just starting to exercise or find that you get tired more easily on exertion, build up your activity gradually. Your energy levels will improve and you will gradually be able to do more exercise. Use goal setting to help you build up the amount of exercise you do. If you feel dizzy or light-headed during physical activity, stop straight away and rest.
A great goal is aiming to be active in as many ways as possible throughout the day and lower the amount of sitting for long periods. Doing just 30 minutes of moderate exercise a day, even in 10 minute chunks, can help to lower your risk of stroke and heart disease. It is important to work within your limits and talk to your doctor about an activity plan for you.
If you are not used to exercising, or have lost confidence in exercise since your AF diagnosis, ask your doctor about programmes which may help you. Starting regular aerobic exercise such as walking, swimming, or cycling is part of long-term treatment for most people with heart disease. You may like to look for a local exercise group, or check out Sports NZ. You could also ask your doctor for a green prescription.
Benefits of exercise for people with atrial fibrillation
Regular physical activity is hugely beneficial to your health, so don’t let AF stop you from enjoying the benefits:
making it easier to do normal daily activities
improving your quality of life
increasing your fitness level
helping to improve heart disease risk factors (high blood pressure, high cholesterol, diabetes)
lowering your risk of further heart problems, hospital admissions and death
Smoking and AF
Nicotine is a cardiac stimulant and can aggravate your AF. Smoking is also a known risk factor for heart attack and stroke.
If you smoke, the absolute best thing you can do for your health is give up today.
It isn’t easy but it isn’t impossible and the benefits from stopping start from day 1.
Every cigarette you smoke is harming you. Most people associate tobacco smoking with breathing problems and lung cancer, but smoking is also a major cause of heart disease for men and women. If you smoke you are 2 to 4 times more likely to suffer a heart attack.
For support in your stop smoking journey, contact Quitline NZ
Alcohol and AF
Excessive drinking is a risk factor for AF. If you have been diagnosed with AF, drinking alcohol - particularly binge drinking - can also trigger or worsen symptoms.
Most people with AF can still enjoy an alcoholic drink if they wish to but it is important to stick within the recommended guidelines for healthy drinking and avoid binge drinking.
If you have AF, it may be best to avoid drinking alcohol, for example:
If you are on medication which interacts with alcohol
If you have an underlying health condition which is made worse by alcohol
Talk to your doctor about whether drinking alcohol is safe for you.
Drinking alcohol comes with risks to your health, and deciding not to drink alcohol is a healthy choice. If you drink alcohol, it’s important to keep within recommended guidelines whether you drink everyday, once or twice a week or occasionally.
Benefits of cutting back on drinking alcohol
There are many benefits of cutting back on your drinking, here are just a few:
Alcohol is high in calories so, if you are trying to lose weight, lowering your alcohol intake in conjunction with a heart healthy eating pattern and regular physical activity could help you reach your goal
Limiting alcohol can help to lower blood pressure and improve cholesterol levels
It may help alleviate symptoms of depression and anxiety
Drinking less will also be better for your wallet!
Want to cut back on your drinking?
If you are concerned about your own, or a loved one’s drinking, and would like tips on easing up or accessing support visit www.alcohol.org.nz
Eating and drinking
Healthy eating and drinking is important for everyone.
Taking steps to set up a heart healthy eating and drinking pattern is a great way to manage your risk factors, look after your heart health and health in general. Healthy eating is not all about “cutting out” food. It involves eating a balanced diet, including more healthy foods and choosing healthier alternatives.
Choosing and preparing meals is often a family affair, so if you are planning to take steps to make changes to what you eat and drink, involve the whole family – they will reap the benefits too.
While most general healthy eating guidelines apply when you have AF, if you are on warfarin you need to be aware that foods high in Vitamin K can affect how warfarin works.
Managing Fatigue
Fatigue is a common problem for people with AF.
Creating routines for a good night’s sleep
Good sleep is important for our health and wellbeing.
Tips for sleeping well:
Exercise daily
Wind down in the evening
Avoid drinking coffee, tea or alcohol before bed
Create a comfortable, dark bedroom – the right temperature and as dark as possible.
The Relaxation Response
Being relaxed is not the same as kicking your shoes off, lying on the sofa and having a drink. Learning deep relaxation and breathing exercises can help lower the amount of adrenaline in your bloodstream. It takes 20 minutes a day, every day for about six to 12 weeks before you get the full benefits of relaxation techniques. Start by listening to lovely free relaxing audio tracks on this website.
How we breathe: “Chest is not best”
Surprisingly, many of us don’t breathe properly. We breathe using our chest muscles instead of our stomach muscles. Think of a little baby lying on its back asleep. It is a baby’s tummy, not the shoulders or chest that move.
Once we all breathed like that, but stress, illness and loss of muscle mean that as we get older we often start to breathe with our chest and take short, shallow breaths. We use our chest muscles and shoulders to suck in air. We do this naturally when we are scared, in pain or exercising hard.
At those times it helps, because it floods our body and brain with extra oxygen and speeds up our heart.
Getting your breathing right slows your heart, lowers your blood pressure and lowers adrenaline.
When we breathe using our chest rather than our stomach in normal life, it can cause problems like:
Palpitations – your heart rhythm is disturbed
Dizziness, feeling light-headed, faint
A feeling of fear and wanting to get away from things
Panic attacks
Poor concentration and memory
Jerky speech
Sighing a lot
Stopping breathing/holding the breath
Feeling like you can’t breathe
Pain in the chest
Strange body sensations
Breathing exercises
When we breathe IN our stomach should move OUT a bit. When we breathe OUT our stomach should fall IN a little. Our upper chest should stay still – all the breathing should be with our lower chest. If that’s not what‘s happening, then try the following breathing exercise:
Lie or sit in a relaxed position and put one hand on your stomach, near your belly button, and put the other hand on your upper chest. Relax your upper chest and shoulders. Now take a gentle breath in by gently pushing out your stomach. Try to keep your chest muscles and shoulders relaxed.
As you breathe out, try to relax. You can use your hand to press on your stomach to help a little. Try to keep your chest and shoulders relaxed.
Keep doing this for a couple of minutes. Stop if you get dizzy. Don’t take huge breaths. Try and breathe quite slowly.
If you find it difficult, you can deliberately push out your stomach muscles when you breathe IN and relax your stomach as you slowly breathe OUT. Or, you can PUSH your stomach in with your hand as you breathe OUT.
Try to set aside five minutes, twice a day to practice this. This will help you to move towards slower, smoother, stomach breathing all of the time.