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Life is risky by nature, but we have the power to make choices that reduce those risks.

You can choose to go skydiving… or not.

You can choose to wear your seatbelt… or not.

And you can choose to get in-tune with your heart and health… or not.

Heart disease isn’t an invisible threat that only happens to 60-year-old men who smoke two packs a day. One in of four deaths is the result of heart disease. That’s one death every 37 seconds.

A dear friend of mine, Dr. Furrukh Malik, has joined me to explore the many layers of heart health and disease. As an invasive cardiologist with specialized training in advanced heart failure and transplantation, Dr. Malik offers valuable insights that may help us understand the real secrets to longevity.

What Does ‘Good Heart Health’ Really Mean?

‘Good heart health’ isn’t a complicated notion. In its simplest form, good heart health means maintaining clean, open blood vessels that support strong, steady circulation.

Think of blood vessels as pipes for all the blood flowing to and from the heart. The pipes must stay open and unobstructed so that blood can quickly deliver oxygen and nutrients to tissues. After which, they transport waste products away.

Good heart health is all too easy to compromise. Just like a bathroom sink becomes clogged with hair, calcium buildup, and toothpaste grime, the pipes of the circulatory system also become blocked from a variety of factors. As those blockages grow, your heart health suffers.

Developing heart disease isn’t like breaking your leg, where your body is healthy one second and debilitated the next. Heart disease brews slowly inside the body, year after year, until symptoms become impossible to ignore.

As Dr. Malik explains, metabolic diseases, inflammatory foods, smoking, and other lifestyle habits all contribute to the development of internal and external inflammation. This double whammy of inflammation attacks blood vessel “pipes” from both directions to lay the foundation for heart disease.

I Have a Family History of Heart Disease: Am I Doomed?

There’s no one linear path to heart disease, even with a strong family history. Your chances of developing heart disease hinge not just on your vulnerability to the most prevalent heart disease risk factors, but also on how you address and mitigate those risk factors.

Dr. Malik organizes heart disease risk factors into two categories: non-modifiable and modifiable.

Non-Modifiable Risk Factors

Certain heart disease risk factors can’t be changed or modified. They exist, whether you like it or not. Non-modifiable risk factors include:

Age

Gender

Genetic profile

These risk factors can’t be switched overnight. Instead, any medical action must carefully take non-modifiable risk factors into consideration.

Modifiable Risk Factors

Modifi

Why does cardiac disease seem to be showing up earlier and more significantly than it has historically? And what can you do to reduce your risk of heart disease? In this episode, Invasive Cardiologist, Dr. Furrukh Malik, addresses the state of cardiac health in America, how to access cardiac risk and stress and the steps you can take towards optimal heart health,

Continuing the conversation from our most popular episode to date, fitness coach, Zane Griggs dives into his best practices for those who want the hows of intermittent fasting. From cheat days to your morning coffee routine, you'll learn the ins and outs of successful fasting and how to tailor it to your life and schedule.

When it comes to improving your health as a man, your first stop may be your general practictioner or cardiologist with a urologist as your last stop. But what if I told you that urological problems such as BPH and erectile dysfunction could be symptoms of something more serious like diabetes or heart disease? Dr. Benjamin Dehner, Chief of Urology at St. Thomas West in Nashville, joins the show for an indepth look at the benefits of owning your urological health, how to catch the warning signs of a deeper issue and advancements in early diagnosis for prostate cancer.

Despite what some in the medical field would have us believe, it's no secret by now that the body functions as one organism, and prevention doesn't happen in a vaccuum. That's why Dr. Ronson Dykstra, DC, is joining the show for a conversation about the benefits of chiropractic medicine when it comes to whole health, misconceptions around chiropractic work and the power of the body as a self-healer.

Spoiler alert: testosterone isn't just for men. Back for another round of discussion on hormone optimization, Nurse Practitioner Jen Justus joins me to dive into the myths around testosterone therapy for women, why it won't turn you into someone you're not and why women should give it a second look.

There are some things that women tend to accept as a part of getting older — always being cold, low energy levels or an increasing waistline — but what if I told you that aging shouldn't mean losing yourself? My right hand, Nurse Practitioner Jen Justus returns for an honest conversation about the warning signs and dangers of suboptimal thyroid levels and how to get your groove back after a slump.

How often do you think about the connection between the health of your mouth and the rest of your body? If you're like most Americans, probably little to none. Leading dental expert, Dr. Thomas Nabors, joins the show to talk about the importance of whole health, co-founding the first salivary diagnostic lab in the U.S. dedicated to the mouth-body connection and the one question every patient should ask their dentist.

Hormone replacement therapy is vital for long-term optimal health. Continuing the discussion from our last episode, Nurse Practitioner Jen Justus returns as we walk through the conversations women should be having around hormone therapy, the importance of estrogen and progesterone, and the "male" hormone women should consider.

Hormone therapy for women is a relatively new and often misunderstood treatment. Nurse Practitioner and my right hand, Jen Justus makes her debut as we break down the Women's Health Initiative study, how we were misled by the results of this historic trial, and what it meant for the perception of bioidentical hormones.

Women's Health Initiative Study: https://www.whi.org/SitePages/WHI%20Home.aspx