Millions of people are at risk for CVD and don’t even know it which puts them at a serious risk for suffering ill health and even dying younger. Knowing heart age can be a simple way to find out whether one might be at risk to help people understand and raise awareness to help make important lifestyle changes to help reduce risks before it becomes too late.
The free online test aks various questions regarding lifestyle and physicality to determine whether a person’s heart age is higher than the person’s actual age, which if it is the case would put them at increased risks for heart attack or stroke. Test results give an immediate estimation of heart age, predicts risks of heart attack or stroke, and suggest lifestyle changes that could be made to help improve risks such as losing weight, exercising, reducing alcohol intake, lower cholesterol, talk to a doctor about blood pressure, and stopping smoking.
Approximately one quarter of the people who die from CVD are under the age of 75, 80% of those deaths could have been prevented if certain lifestyle and behavioral changes had been made to reduce risk and help improve heart health.
In England as much as one quarter of the adult population has high blood pressure, with 5.6 million predicted as not having the condition diagnosed which increases risks of stroke or heart attack by three-fold. It is estimated that there are 50 preventable deaths every day among people under the age of 75, making it vital to take steps to make people more aware of risks and heart health to take measures to reduce these rates.
The free online heart age test can be found at: https://www.nhs.uk/oneyou/be-healthier/check-your-health/heart-age-test/