Tips to Keep Yourself Healthy
Everyone wants to live a healthy and happy life but is unable to do so in today’s hectic and unmanaged lifestyle. Let’s have a look at some of the tips that help maintain a healthy lifestyle and avoid major illnesses.
1. Eat A Healthy Diet
The first and the most important thing is what you eat. You should eat a combination of various foods, including vegetables, fruit, nuts, legumes, and whole grains. A normal adult should eat at least 400 gm or five portions of vegetables and fruits every day. There are multiple ways to better your intake of vegetables and fruits by always including fresh fruit and vegetables as snacks; eating veggies in your meal; eating a variety of vegetables and fruits and making sure to eat them in season. Eating healthy reduces your risk of malnutrition and non-communicable diseases (NCDs) like diabetes, stroke, heart disease, and cancer.
2. Consume Less Salt And Sugar
People of the Philippines consume as much as double the recommended amount of sodium which increases the chances of high blood pressure, which results in increasing the risk of stroke and heart disease. The majority of the people get their sodium intake through salt. Recommended salt intake is only 5g per day which is equivalent to about one teaspoon. You can easily limit your sodium intake by reducing the use of salt, fish sauce, soy sauce, and other high-sodium condiments in meals; removing seasonings, salt, and condiments; avoiding salty snacks; and preferring low-sodium products.
On the other hand, consuming more sugar increases the risk of unhealthy weight gain and tooth decay. Recommended free sugar intake in both children and adults is less than 10% of total energy intake. It is equivalent to 50g for an adult. For additional health benefits, the WHO recommends consuming less than 5% of total energy intake. Reduce your sugar intake by reducing the consumption of candies, sugary snacks, and sugar-sweetened beverages.
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3. Reduce Intake of Harmful Fats
Normally consumption of fats should be less than 30% of your overall energy intake. It is helpful in the prevention of unhealthy weight gain and NCDs. There are multiple types of fats, in which unsaturated fats are preferred over trans fats and saturated fats. For some additional health benefits WHO recommends saturated fats be less than 10% of total energy intake; trans fats to be less than 1% of total energy intake, and also replacing both trans fats and saturated fats with unsaturated fats.
The preferred unsaturated fats are found in avocado, fish, sunflower, nuts, canola, soybean, and olive oils. Saturated fats are found in butter, fatty meat, coconut oil, palm, cheese, cream, ghee, and lard. Whereas trans-fats are found in fried and baked foods, pre-packaged foods, and snacks, such as cookies, frozen pizza, cooking oils, biscuits, and spreads.
4. Avoid Harmful Use of Alcohol
There is no recommended safe level for drinking alcohol. Alcohol consumption can lead to many health conditions such as behavioral and mental disorders, including alcohol addiction, major NCDs like liver cirrhosis, some cancers and heart diseases, also various injuries due to violence and road collisions and clashes.
5. Don’t Smoke
Smoking tobacco causes NCDs such as heart disease, lung disease, and also stroke. Tobacco not only affects the smoker but also the non-smoker through second-hand exposure. Currently, millions of people smoke tobacco but the interesting thing is that 7 out of 10 smokers are interested or planning to quit.
It’s never too late to quit a bad habit. Once you quit smoking, you will experience instant and also long-term health benefits. If you are a non-smoker, what can be better than this? Don’t start and also fight for your right to breathe smoke-tobacco-free air.
6. Be Active
Physical activity is not only exercising it is any bodily movement made by skeletal muscles that need energy expenditure. It includes activities and exercises undertaken while playing, working, traveling, carrying out household chores, and taking part in recreational pursuits. The recommended amount of physical activity needed is dependent on your age group. Adults in the age group of 18-64 years should do around 150 minutes of physical activity per week. If you want additional health benefits you can increase your physical activity to 300 minutes per week.
7. Check Your Blood Pressure Regularly
High blood pressure or hypertension is called a “silent killer”. As it does not show any symptoms many times, the sufferer may not even be aware of the problem. Leaving it uncontrolled can lead to kidney, brain, heart, and other diseases. Make sure to have your blood pressure checked at regular intervals so that you know about your condition. If you suffer from high blood pressure, take assistance from a proper health worker. This is crucial in the control and also prevention of hypertension.
8. Get Tested
To properly know your health status it is best to get yourself tested, especially when it comes to hepatitis B, HIV, tuberculosis (TB), and sexually-transmitted infections (STIs). If left untreated, these diseases can cause serious complications and sometimes even death. Knowing your current status will help you to understand what you need to do for the prevention or if you tested positive for any of these diseases you may get the treatment and care that you require.
9. Get Vaccinated
One of the best and the most efficient ways of diseases is to get vaccinated. Vaccines work best because they work with the body’s natural defense to boost protection against diseases like cholera, cervical cancer, hepatitis B, diphtheria, measles, influenza, pneumonia, mumps, rabies, polio, tetanus, rubella, typhoid, and yellow fever.
10. Practice Safe Sex
Taking care of your sexual health is significant for your overall well-being and health. Practicing safe sex is crucial for the prevention of HIV and other sexually transmitted infections such as gonorrhoeic and syphilis. There are many preventive measures available out here such as pre-exposure prophylaxis (PrEP) that protects you from HIV and condoms that protect you from HIV and other STIs.
11. Drink Only Safe Water
Drinking unsafe water can be very dangerous as it may lead to many water-borne diseases such as diarrhea, cholera, typhoid, hepatitis A, and polio. Around the world, about 2 billion people drink water that is contaminated with feces. Check with your water refilling station and water supplier to make sure that the water you’re drinking is safe. If you are living in a place where you are not sure about the purity of the water. Just boil your water for about a minute and let it cool naturally, it will kill harmful organisms in the water.
12. Have Regular Check-Ups
Regular health check-ups can help find health problems before they even start. Health care providers can help find and diagnose health problems early which will increase your chances for better treatment and cure.