Fibromyalgiaand heart health may be more closely connected than people realize.
It also offers tips on how to treat symptoms and moderate your risk of heart conditions.
Knowing your risk is a positive thing because it gives you a chance to make healthy changes.
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When moving leads to pain, people tend to move less.
Fibromyalgia can cause chest pain resulting from inflammation of the cartilage of the ribs and sternum (breastbone).
Talk your healthcare provider if you’re having chest pain to rule out heart-related and other problems.
The same study also found a link between heart rate variability and depression in people with fibromyalgia.
Stress, depression, and anxiety are three factors that have been linked to poor heart health.
They can put you at higher risk for heart attack and stroke earlier in life.
Research has found cardiac abnormalities linked to fibromyalgia that are not associated with these traditional cardiovascular risk factors.
Theautonomic nervous systemis believed to be dysregulated in fibromyalgia.
It controls a lot of automatic functions in your body, including heart rate and blood pressure.
A 2018 paper inFrontiers in Physiologyappears to provide evidence to back that hypothesis.
Each peak and valley and the distances between them can tell an expert a lot about your heart health.
The baroreflex helps your body with homeostasis, which is what keeps things like the internal temperature in balance.
Specifically, the baroreflex is part of what keeps your blood pressure at a nearly constant level.
The researchers were not able to explain this effect by abnormal muscle metabolism.
Their explanation is deconditioning due to reduced physical activity.
Possible Treatments
Exercise can be difficult for people with fibromyalgia, but modifications can be made.
Research shows that exercise is an important part of managing symptoms.
You don’t have to make exercise complicated.
Some treatments are under investigation for some of the specific cardiac abnormalities linked to fibromyalgia.
Researchers reported that SET resulted in significant and long-lasting pain remission and was more effective than the other treatments.
Our bodies don’t do well with sudden, extreme changes.
Your healthcare provider may be able to help you find simple dietary changes that can improve your cardiovascular health.
With care, some people can gradually increase activity levels, but it all depends on the approach.
Summary
Hearing that your fibromyalgia could make you more likely to develop heart disease can be frightening.
Walking is a great place to start.
Consider this as an opportunity to get started on working toward better heart health.
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