Screen time or sleep time: Is the sedentary lifestyle a cholesterol trap for the youth?
Poor diet and lack of exercise pose serious health threats.
SHAH ALAM - Many working individuals are familiar with a desk-bound lifestyle, often resorting to ultra-processed foods due to time constraints.
However, maintaining such a lifestyle long-term proved detrimental to health, particularly regarding cardiovascular diseases, often referred to as silent killers.
National Heart Institute (IJN) clinical fellow Dr Rowina Lynne Murray said that a poor diet, combined with inactivity, could easily escalate cholesterol levels, identifying it as a key contributing factor to cardiovascular diseases.
According to the World Heart Federation, cardiovascular diseases remained the leading cause of death globally, accounting for over 20.5 million fatalities annually.
To prevent these diseases, Dr Rowina emphasised the importance of regular health screenings, which could be conducted during medical check-ups at local clinics or through home test kits available at pharmacies like Alpro.
She clarified that increased screen time correlated with decreased physical activity, leading to cholesterol buildup.
Other factors contributing to heart-related diseases included inadequate sleep, poor stress management, and neglecting self-care.
Dr Rowina also raised awareness about the significance of a positive health attitude, noting that it was crucial to adopt a mindset that allowed individuals to accept and apply doctors' advice by proactively improving their lifestyle.
In addition to health attitudes, she discussed socioeconomic factors, noting that studies showed heart diseases disproportionately affected people from lower socioeconomic statuses compared to those in higher income brackets.
"There is not a single factor that defines a bad health attitude; it can also be due to people, having different priorities in their life.
"However, rich people have more access to healthy food and time to go to the gym, altogether making it easier to have a healthy lifestyle," she said.
Relating health attitudes to financial status, Dr Rowina agreed that even successful individuals could face health risks if they neglected their health due to other life priorities.
Addressing the age factor, she pointed out that while older people were more commonly affected, younger individuals were increasingly becoming patients.
She further argued that the country lacked actions such as the global Heart for Action movement to raise awareness about cardiovascular diseases.
She urged the government to implement campaigns and laws highlighting the environmental impact on heart health..
"Certain laws in other countries restrict the amount of sugar added in commercialised food.
"In Japan and Denmark, they don't accept fruit juice in packaging that does not contain 100 per cent of the fruit but claim that they do on their packaging.
"The law would enforce them to put an image of the fruit not fully cut open or replacing the fruit image with cartoon images that indirectly tells consumers that the drinks are not 100 per cent made of the fruit juice," she added.
She acknowledged that the Malaysian health ministry is moving in the right direction by encouraging transparency among food companies, which can help consumers recognise and avoid products with excessive sugar.
Dr Rowina acknowledged that Malaysia's health ministry was moving in the right direction by promoting transparency among food companies, helping consumers identify and avoid products with excessive sugar..
For individuals living a sedentary lifestyle, she advised being mindful of screen time as a crucial first step..
"For those making significant changes, start small and don't overwhelm yourself.
"Focus on manageable changes first; over time, these will develop into sustainable habits," she said.
Dr Rowina also described that cholesterol buildup could begin as early as childhood.
"Early exposure to a high-cholesterol lifestyle poses risks.
"People often concentrate on their cholesterol levels, but it's essential to consider the duration of elevated levels, even if they are moderate," she said.
In addition to reducing screen time, Dr Rowina recommended maintaining a balanced diet and regular exercise to prevent cholesterol buildup and mitigate the risk of cardiovascular diseases, such as heart failure and heart attacks.
She also pointed out that physical indicators of high cholesterol, such as cholesterol deposits around the eyes, known as xanthelasma, and milia seeds.
However, she stressed that these signs were rare and unreliable as indicators, making regular check-ups critical for maintaining heart health.
