As mentioned yesterday, hypertension (high blood pressure) increases our risk of cardiovascular disease. In this post, we are going to explain what constitutes cardiovascular disease and how can we decrease our risk of it. DECIPHERING MEDICAL JARGON Cardiovascular: cardio- heart; -vascular vessels. Relating to the heart and blood vessels, i.e. the circulatory system.Cardiovascular disease (CVD for short) comprise a very broad spectrum of diseases. Most commonly in the context of the general population, it is used to describe acute coronary syndrome - the medical term for chest pain and heart attacks. Other diseases included under the umbrella of CVD are: stroke, cardiomyopathy, heart failure, heart block, peripheral vascular disease, thromboembolism, and venous thrombosis. These diseases will not be addressed in this article, but interested readers are highly encouraged to talk to our health educators at Doc2Us
