Is it ok to do physical activity after suffering a heart attack? Many people consider running and recovery after a heart attack as incompatible.
This article will answer essential questions about running after a heart attack and give helpful tips.
What Should I Know About Running After a Heart Attack?
Can You Exercise After a Heart Attack?
The natural reaction of many people who suffer a heart attack is to avoid all physical activity, especially running, as they are afraid of complications.
Still, many doctors prescribe exercise to their patients with careful monitoring and medical supervision.
The truth is that inactivity can cause more significant harm than regular physical activity, worsening your heart and even leading to an earlier death. So, sitting on a couch and being afraid is worse than exercising. The main thing is to follow the plan prescribed by your doctor.
Your heart is a muscle. And any muscle becomes stronger after regular physical activity.
Benefits of Normal Physical Activity
According to many studies, regular physical activity can:
- Lower your risk of other heart diseases, hospital admissions, and premature death.
- Lower your risk of non-cardiac-related causes of death and low blood pressure.
- Help to keep normal blood glucose in people with type 2 diabetes.
- Help to improve fitness and strength.
- Reduce depression and anxiety, increase the quality of your life, and normalize sleep quality.
What Is the Difference Between Physical Activity and Exercising?
Both of them are very important to keep your wellness in good condition. The main difference is that exercising is a planned activity that you control and create its structure—for example, going to the gym a couple of times a week, jogging in the mornings, etc. In this case, it is an exercise and a kind of physical activity.
According to this study, physical activity is any bodily movement produced by skeletal muscles that result in energy expenditure. Physical activity in daily life can be categorized into occupational, sports, conditioning, household, or other activities.
When Can I Start Exercising After a Heart Attack?
According to the Heart Foundation, there is no clear answer to this question as each situation is different. But the most important thing you need to remember when starting exercise after a heart attack is to not engage in self-treatment. Talk to your doctor first.
Your doctor can suggest the level and type of activity depending on your circumstances – paying attention to your physical condition, medication, abilities, and needs. Ask your doctor to prescribe you an exercise-based cardiac rehabilitation program or the Green Prescription program for supervised exercise (where available).
What Type of Activity to Choose?
Your first six weeks will be with low activity levels. You must concentrate on short activities, which will increase depending on your condition. Start with short walks to your mailbox, which will be 3 minutes maximum. As you feel better, increase the duration of each walk.
You should achieve a goal of 150 minutes of moderate-intensity exercise per week: it may be as a 30-minute walk 5 days a week or 20 minutes of cleaning the house, 15 minutes of gardening, and 5 minutes of walking five days a week – all depending on your condition and preferences. When you have achieved your goal, you may increase your activity by adding speed to your walks or walking on a hilly surface.
You should add different kinds of physical activity – it will help increase your wellness and make the process more enjoyable.
Cardio after a heart attack is essential as it helps increase your heart and breathing rate.
Combine aerobic or cardio with some strength exercises to work with your heart rhythm and resistance.
The Heart Foundation recommends these exercises after a heart attack:
- jogging
- brisk walking
- shopping
- cycling
- household chores like cleaning, vacuuming, or mopping
- gardening
- yoga or Pilates
- organized sports
- dancing
- weight training
- swimming
The British Heart Foundation gives more concrete exercises for recovery after a heart attack based on time:
- 1 week – making light snacks, pottering around the house and garden, peeling vegetables while sitting;
- 2 weeks – light housework, such as making beds, washing up, and preparing simple meals;
- 3-4 weeks – housework, such as hanging out, washing, tidying, and dusting, with rests. Carrying shopping bags or pulling a shopping trolley. Light gardening, such as gentle weeding or potting;
- 5 weeks – vacuuming, ironing, moderate gardening (mowing the lawn, light hoeing);
- 7-8 weeks – DIY, lifting
Afterward, you can ask your doctor if you can try some running and create a running schedule unique to your situation.
Also, you can use the help of clinical exercise physiologists who assist people with heart diseases.
What Type of Exercises to Avoid?
You should understand that the main thing is intensity – even yoga can be considered unsafe if you do it incorrectly. There are some yoga asanas forbidden for people with heart diseases. Avoid high-intensity exercises.
Speaking of strenuous exercises, you should remember the body’s natural response during heavy training (when we try to lift anything heavy) is to hold our breath, but this can limit blood flow to the heart and may cause lightheadedness or fainting. Logically, you should not perform exercise that forces you to hold your breath while lifting.
Always check with your doctor before starting a new type of cardiovascular exercise following a heart attack.
What About Running After Heart Surgery?
Can you jog with stents? According to Narayana Health, loads after stenting should be moderate – you should start with easy and short walks, slowly increasing the load.
It may seem okay to exercise normally right after the procedure if you have had sports experience, but it is wrong. One can expect to reach the pre-disease exercise status within one month of a stenting procedure. On the contrary, heavy exercise, such as lifting weights or walking on a hilly surface, should be avoided for about 4-6 weeks.
British Heart Foundation recommends the following activities after surgery:
- 1-4 weeks – housework, such as hanging out, washing, tidying, and dusting, with rests. Light gardening, such as potting. Sexual activity (but don’t use your arms to support yourself);
- 4-6 weeks – golf – walking the course and putting, not the full swing;
- 8 weeks – bowls, dancing;
- 10-12 weeks – swimming, road cycling;
- 12 weeks – Racket sports, fishing, golf with full swing, lifting children, vacuuming, mowing the lawn, digging, pushing shopping carts, and carrying shopping bags. Your breastbone and the muscles in your chest take time to heal, so do not do lifting or heavy arm activity in the first 12 weeks, as it could delay the healing process.
Only at this point can you start thinking about harder exercises, like running, and only if your doctor permits it. Then you should create your own running schedule with your specialist. You should find a middle ground, as normal exercise is important for surgery recovery.
In general, when talking about activity after surgery, you should combine the tips from the previous block with the advice from this one.
Do Runners Have Heart Attacks?
Runners can suffer cardiovascular diseases like heart attacks just like any other person – it all depends on genetics, lifestyle, nutrition, and psychological factors.
According to this study, factors that can cause heart problems are high levels of low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol, smoking, hypertension, diabetes, abdominal obesity, psychosocial factors, insufficient consumption of fruits and vegetables, excess consumption of alcohol, and lack of regular physical activity.
Each person should try to stay healthy, schedule a physical once a year, and follow the doctor’s recommendations.
Can you get a heart attack from running? Of course, some factors can lead to it – like regularly overtraining and doing more than you can, especially if you have restrictions due to health. According to research, regular excessive endurance exercise can harm the cardiovascular system. Such endurance exercises include marathons, ultra marathons, iron man, etc. They can be especially bad for people after 45.
Still, you should understand that you can get a heart attack running a marathon only if you ignore your heart wellness. You should start preparing for a marathon only after visiting your doctor and continue doing it each year. Thus, you can be sure that everything is okay and that you won’t get any cardiovascular disease after running.
Besides, you should train to stay within your anaerobic threshold – the highest sustained intensity of exercise for which measurement of oxygen uptake can account for the entire energy requirement. To know more about it, you should read our article.
Wrap Up
Running is not the first exercise you can do during recovery after a heart attack or heart surgery. First, you should practice regular activity, and only after the doctor’s okay, you may create a running schedule. And even then, you should understand that you won’t return to your previous level soon.
Still, if you don’t have problems with your heart but are afraid to run, remember that running helps your body and prevents cardiovascular diseases. Optimal running for health is once a week or for 50 minutes a week. It reduces the risk of death at a given point in time.
