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If you monitor your health then you probably know there are a range of ways to assess your health risk. This can include activities like measuring your weight, keeping track of your blood sugar and assessing your physical activity levels. Assessing your health in this way is incredibly important no matter what your health status is. But if you have heart disease, it’s even more important. Finding effective ways of measuring the health of your heart can be pivotal in avoiding future problems. That’s why any test that can help with this should be a part of your health assessment activities. And this is where bioimpedance comes in.

 

What is Bioimpedance?

Bioimpedance is a way to measure body fat. Basically, weak electrical currents are sent into a part of the body, usually the legs. Body composition machines can then calculate the percentage of body fat by how easily the currents pass through the body. If there’s more water and fluid in the tissues, the electricity passes through quicker. The water literally conducts the electricity, and the impedance, or resistance, is lower.

 

The electrical currents are completely painless and you probably won’t even feel them. But despite the weakness of the current, this is a highly effective way to calculate body fat. It may also be the most accurate way to measure the risk of heart disease currently available.

 

The results of bioimpedance are not always easy to use or understand. As a result, this measurement tool has gone out of fashion in most clinical practices. Doctors today mostly use other methods of assessing body fat such as BMI. However, these methods may not be as accurate as bioimpedance. Bioimpedance is also very easy to measure. Patients literally just stand on a set of scales while electrical currents are sent through the feet. This makes it a very effective and simple way to assess heart health.

 

Heart Disease and Bioimpedance

A recent study has suggested that bioimpedance may be an effective way to calculate health risk. The researchers found that lower leg bioimpedance may be tied to a higher risk of heart failure. When someone is in heart failure, their heart continues to beat but can’t pump enough blood around the body to sustain life. It’s a very common disorder and a serious health risk for countless people around the world.

 

In the study, researchers examined more than 3,500 health risk factors to determine which were mostly strongly linked to heart failure. Some of the results were obvious. For example, obesity and diabetes were strongly represented. However, bioimpedance was also a strong indicator of health risk, and this was unexpected.

 

The link between bioimpedance and heart failure may be due to fluid build-up. When there’s more fluid in the lower legs, the electricity moves faster through the tissues. And fluid build-up is an extremely common side effect of early heart failure. It may even occur before other symptoms such as shortness of breath and fatigue.

 

Implications of the Study

If the link between bioimpedance and heart disease is proven, it could have a number of health implications. It could aid in early diagnosis of heart failure, allowing early treatment and perhaps even prevention. In fact, some researchers believe that bioimpedance could predict heart failure a number of years before it occurs. This is important because early diagnosis and treatment is key to recovering from this disorder.

 

This link is also important because it indicates a way to assess heart health in people who are sedentary. Heart failure is often caused by heart and lung anomalies. However, when people are sedentary these anomalies can go unnoticed. Using bioimpendance may be a way to identify those anomalies long before they cause damage that leads to heart failure.

 

Bioimpedance and Your Health Assessments

The strong link between bioimpedence and heart health means that this measurement should be added to your regular health assessment activities. This is particularly true if you have other health risk factors linked to heart failure. So make sure you talk to your doctor about bioimpendance during your next appointment.

 

 

If you have a high risk of heart disease, try using HomeLab to keep track of your condition and any preventative measures you take. And if you see signs of a significant problem, you should check with your doctor as soon as possible.

 

Tags: health risk, heart health, heart disease