Shalini is worried. Her good friend, who is in her early fifties, has been diagnosed as having ischaemic heart disease. This means that the blood vessels supplying oxygen to her heart muscles are narrowing and the circulation to the heart muscles is being compromised. Shalini knows that exercise is important in maintaining health. Is there anyway she can exercise to ensure the health of her heart?

Physical inactivity, along with high blood pressure and high blood cholesterol is one of the major modifiable risk factors for heart attack.  There is no guarantee that you will not get heart disease, but you will reduce your chance of heart disease if you avoid the risk factors.

People middle-aged or older, who are inactive and at high risk for heart disease (or who already have a medical condition), should seek medical advice before they start or significantly increase their physical activity.  Most healthy people of any age, with no known major illness, can safely engage inmoderate levels of physical activity ( e.g., moderate walking or cycling) without consulting a doctor first.

How much exercise is enough? If you're inactive, doing anything is better than nothing!  Studies show that people who have a low fitness level are much more likely to die early than people who have achieved even a moderate level of fitness.  If you want to achieve a moderate level of fitness, you need to exercise for at least 20-30 minutes a day, 3-5 days of the week, at 50-60 percent of your maximum capacity. Vigorous exercise is not required.

When people first start exercising, they get alarmed by the fact that their heart beats faster or that they get tired easily. Aches and pains from unused muscles also quickly dissuade people from keeping up a regular exercise program. It is important to remember that the potential health benefits of exercise greatly outweigh the risks.

Frequency of exercise

The first component of successful cardiovascular exercise work out plans is the frequency of the exercise, which refers to the number of exercise sessions per week. To improve both your cardiovascular work out plans and to decrease body fat or maintain body fat at optimum levels, you should exercise at least three days a week. People who are very out of shape and/or who are overweight and doing weight-bearing cardiovascular exercise such as an aerobics class or jogging, should initially have at least 36 to 48 hours of rest between workouts to prevent an injury and to promote adequate bone and joint stress recovery.

Duration of exercise

It is important that you gradually increase the duration before you increase the intensity of the work out plans. That is, when beginning a walking program, for example, be more concerned with increasing the number of minutes of the exercise session before you increase the intensity (which is done by increasing your speed.)