Heart is circulation

What are heart and circulatory diseases?
Sometimes the heart and circulatory system don’t work like they should, this can cause heart and circulatory diseases (also called cardiovascular diseases). We fund research into these conditions and their risk factors, including:

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  coronary heart disease (heart attack and angina)
  
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  congenital heart disease
  
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  inherited heart conditions
  
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  stroke
  
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  vascular dementia
  
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  diabetes.
  

What causes your heart and circulatory system to go wrong?
P roblems with your heart and circulatory system, including heart attack or a stroke, are usually caused by a gradual build-up of fatty material (called atheroma) in the arteries around the heart and in the arteries that supply blood to your brain.
The fatty material lines the walls of heart’s coronary arteries making the space for blood to flow narrower. When the arteries become narrowed and the blood flow is restricted, the arteries can’t deliver enough blood to the heart and the brain, which can cause heart and circulatory diseases.
What puts me at risk of heart and circulatory disease?
Many heart and circulatory diseases share the same risk factors including:

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  poorly managed diabetes
  
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  high blood pressure
  
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  high cholesterol
  
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  being overweight or obese
  
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  smoking
  
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  drinking too much alcohol.
  

Heart and circulatory diseases can be worrying but the good news is that there are lots of things you can do to reduce your risk of developing heart and circulatory diseases now.