{"id":6189,"date":"2017-01-25T08:00:03","date_gmt":"2017-01-25T13:00:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/healthyhorizons\/?p=6189"},"modified":"2017-01-18T13:18:37","modified_gmt":"2017-01-18T18:18:37","slug":"heart-rate-questions","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/healthyhorizons\/workout-wednesday\/heart-rate-questions\/","title":{"rendered":"Heart Rate Questions"},"content":{"rendered":"<h4>What should you know about your heart rate? \u00a0<img decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/www.heart.org\/idc\/groups\/heart-public\/@wcm\/@hcm\/documents\/image\/ucm_438852@z_extracted~1\/large.jpg\" \/><\/h4>\n<p>Even if you\u2019re not an athlete, knowledge about your heart rate can help you monitor your fitness level \u2014 and it might even help you spot developing health problems.<\/p>\n<p>Your heart rate, or pulse, is the number of times your heart beats per minute. Normal heart rate varies from person to person. Knowing yours can be an important heart-health gauge.<\/p>\n<p>As you age, changes in the rate and regularity of your pulse can change and may signify a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.heart.org\/HEARTORG\/Conditions\/Conditions_UCM_001087_SubHomePage.jsp\" class=\"broken_link\">heart condition<\/a> or other condition that needs to be addressed.<\/p>\n<h4>Where is it and what is a normal heart rate?<\/h4>\n<p>The best places to find your pulse are the:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>wrists<\/li>\n<li>inside of your elbow<\/li>\n<li>side of your neck<\/li>\n<li>top of the foot<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>To get the most accurate reading, put your finger over your pulse and count the number of beats in 60 seconds.<\/p>\n<p>Your <strong>resting heart rate<\/strong> is the heart pumping the lowest amount of blood you need because you\u2019re not exercising. If you\u2019re sitting or lying and you\u2019re calm, relaxed and aren\u2019t ill, your heart rate is normally between 60 (beats per minute)\u00a0and 100 (beats per minute).<\/p>\n<p>But a heart rate lower than 60 doesn\u2019t\u00a0necessarily signal a medical problem. It could be the result of taking a drug such as a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.heart.org\/HEARTORG\/Conditions\/HeartAttack\/TreatmentofaHeartAttack\/Cardiac-Medications_UCM_303937_Article.jsp\" class=\"broken_link\">beta blocker<\/a>. A lower heart rate is also common for people who get a lot of physical activity or are very athletic. Active people often have lower heart rates because their heart muscle is in better condition and doesn\u2019t need to work as hard to maintain a steady beat.<\/p>\n<p>Moderate physical activity doesn\u2019t usually change the resting pulse much. If you\u2019re very fit, it could change to 40. A less active person might have a heart rate between 60 and 100. That\u2019s because the heart muscle has to work harder to maintain bodily functions, making it higher.<\/p>\n<h4>How Other Factors Affect Heart Rate<\/h4>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Air temperature:<\/strong> When temperatures (and the humidity) soar, the heart pumps a little more blood, so your pulse rate may increase, but usually no more than five to 10 beats a minute.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Body position:<\/strong> Resting, sitting or standing, your pulse is usually the same. Sometimes as you stand for the first 15 to 20 seconds, your pulse may go up a little bit, but after a couple of minutes it should settle down. Emotions: If you\u2019re stressed, anxious or \u201cextraordinarily happy or sad\u201d your emotions can raise your pulse.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Body size:<\/strong> Body size usually doesn\u2019t change pulse. If you\u2019re very obese, you might see a higher resting pulse than normal, but usually not more than 100.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Medication use: <\/strong>Meds that block your adrenaline (beta blockers) tend to slow your pulse, while too much\u00a0thyroid medication or too high of a dosage will raise it.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<h4>When To Call Your Doctor<\/h4>\n<p>If you\u2019re on a beta blocker to\u00a0decrease your heart rate (and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.heart.org\/HEARTORG\/Conditions\/HighBloodPressure\/MakeChangesThatMatter\/Changes-You-Can-Make-to-Manage-High-Blood-Pressure_UCM_002054_Article.jsp\" class=\"broken_link\">lower blood pressure<\/a>) or to control an abnormal rhythm (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.heart.org\/HEARTORG\/Conditions\/Arrhythmia\/Arrhythmia_UCM_002013_SubHomePage.jsp\" class=\"broken_link\">arrhythmia<\/a>), your doctor may ask you to monitor and log your heart rate. Keeping tabs on your heart rate can help your doctor determine whether to change the dosage or switch to a different medication.<\/p>\n<p>If your pulse is very low or if you have frequent episodes of unexplained fast heart rates, especially if they cause you to feel weak or dizzy or faint, tell your doctor, who can decide if it\u2019s an emergency. Your pulse is one tool to help get a picture of your health.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/www.heart.org\/HEARTORG\/Conditions\/More\/MyHeartandStrokeNews\/All-About-Heart-Rate-Pulse_UCM_438850_Article.jsp#.WH-wtdIrKM8\" class=\"broken_link\">http:\/\/www.heart.org\/HEARTORG\/Conditions\/More\/MyHeartandStrokeNews\/All-About-Heart-Rate-Pulse_UCM_438850_Article.jsp#.WH-wtdIrKM8<\/a><\/p>\n<!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on the_content --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on the_content -->","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>What should you know about your heart rate? \u00a0 Even if you\u2019re not an athlete, knowledge about your heart rate can help you monitor your fitness level \u2014 and it might even help you spot developing health problems. Your heart &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/healthyhorizons\/workout-wednesday\/heart-rate-questions\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><!-- AddThis Advanced Settings generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><!-- AddThis Share Buttons generic via filter on get_the_excerpt --><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9193321,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[15126],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6189","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-workout-wednesday"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paB9fc-1BP","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/healthyhorizons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6189","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/healthyhorizons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/healthyhorizons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/healthyhorizons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9193321"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/healthyhorizons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6189"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/healthyhorizons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6189\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":6203,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/healthyhorizons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6189\/revisions\/6203"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/healthyhorizons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6189"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/healthyhorizons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6189"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/blogs.butler.edu\/healthyhorizons\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6189"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}