{"id":73122,"date":"2016-09-16T10:00:26","date_gmt":"2016-09-16T14:00:26","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/?p=73122"},"modified":"2016-09-15T20:04:39","modified_gmt":"2016-09-16T00:04:39","slug":"aha-september-is-afib-awareness-month","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/?p=73122","title":{"rendered":"AHA September is AFib Awareness Month"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/?attachment_id=72621\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-72621\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignright size-full wp-image-72621\" src=\"http:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/american-heart.jpg\" alt=\"american heart\" width=\"219\" height=\"144\" srcset=\"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/american-heart.jpg 219w, https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/08\/american-heart-150x99.jpg 150w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 219px) 100vw, 219px\" \/><\/a>An irregular heartbeat, called atrial fibrillation or AFib, increases your risk of stroke by five\u00a0times. AFib affects more than 2.7 million Americans, many over age 60. This September, during\u00a0National AFib Awareness Month, the American Heart Association is teaching those at highest\u00a0risk how to spot and manage AFib to avoid stroke.<\/p>\n<p>AFib can have symptoms such as an irregular feeling heartbeat, shortness of breath and\u00a0lightheadedness or it can have no symptoms at all. Even if you are not experiencing symptoms of\u00a0AFib, your stroke risk is still increased five-fold.<\/p>\n<p>Stroke risks are increased because when the heart is in AFib, it is not moving blood\u00a0effectively around <!--more-->the heart. Blood pools and clots can form. When the clot is pumped out of the\u00a0heart, it can travel to the brain and cause a stroke.<\/p>\n<p>That\u2019s what happened to Carl Romero of Hamilton, New Jersey. Four years ago, while\u00a0working out with his son, Romero, now 48, experienced an erratic heartbeat and pounding in his\u00a0chest. That led him to his doctors who diagnosed him with AFib. Seven months later he went on\u00a0to have a stroke. The experience opened his eyes about the need for major lifestyle changes.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThis forced me to really be conscious of my AFib and take note of what I was putting in my\u00a0body and how it was affecting me,\u201d Romero said. \u201cBe empowered to do the things you can do.\u00a0Changing diet isn\u2019t a doctor\u2019s decision \u2013 it\u2019s the patient\u2019s.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Hypertension, heart disease, diabetes and heart failure are major risk factors for AFib. If you\u00a0suspect you have AFib, meet with your doctor. AFib can be managed, helping you avoid stroke\u00a0and live a longer, healthier life. Because AF can be tricky to find, it may also be an underlying\u00a0condition in cryptogenic stroke patients.<\/p>\n<p>To access resources for AFib Awareness Month, visit heart.org\/afibawareness.\u00a0For those living with atrial fibrillation, the American Heart Association has developed\u00a0resources including a symptom tracker, tips for dealing with AFib in all areas of your life and a\u00a0community of survivors at MyAFibExperience.org.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An irregular heartbeat, called atrial fibrillation or AFib, increases your risk of stroke by five\u00a0times. AFib affects more than 2.7 million Americans, many over age 60. This September, during\u00a0National AFib Awareness Month, the American Heart Association is teaching those at highest\u00a0risk how to spot and manage AFib to avoid stroke. AFib can have symptoms such [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":72621,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23810,8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-73122","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-wellbeing","category-top-story"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=73122"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73122\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/72621"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=73122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=73122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/madisoncountycourier.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=73122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}