What Types Of Exercises Are Best To Prevent Heart Disease?

Sidney C. Smith Jr., M.D., Professor of Medicine; Director, Center for Cardiovascular Science and Medicine, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

December 24, 2008

Question: What types of exercises are best to prevent heart disease?

Answer: If you're thinking about preventing heart disease, the type of exercise is important. In general, aerobic exercise carries greater benefits than the isometric weight lifting type exercise, but both are good.

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I, personally, recommend varying exercise. I like running, I like cycling, swimming is good, walking rapidly is good. So a varied type of exercise carries benefit, and I think that upper body as well as lower body exercise is good, so some of the aerobic exercises that you encounter in gyms will give you both upper body and lower body, and that's nice to do.

Some amount of weight lifting is not harmful, but it doesn't need to be a lot, and too much can be very difficult if you have high blood pressure, so primarily aerobic exercise, daily, look for opportunities to get at least half an hour of physical activity every day. Your heart will be better for it.

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