The 15 Minute Heart Cure : The Natural Way to Release Stress and Heal Your Heart in Just Minutes a Day

From a top cardiologist-simple stress-reduction techniques to prevent and reverse the four major kinds of heart disease The 15 Minute Heart Cure shows how stress can harm our cardiovascular system and offers practical, easy ways to dispel stress naturally, without spending a lot of time or money. It explains the stress-heart disease connection for the four major types of heart disease-heart attack, arrythmia, congestive heart failure, and cardiac valve disease-and equips you with the author's proven BREATHE technique to help you stop stress in its tracks. Teaches the BREATHE (beginning, relaxation, envision, apply, treatment, heal, end) technique to help you heal and protect your heart Gives you specific stress-reducing breathing and guided imagery exercises you can do anywhere, anytime First book by a leading cardiologist on the stress-heart disease connection-Dr. Kennedy is the former director of Cardiac Catheterization Laboratory and director of Inpatient Cardiology, Kaiser Permanente Medical Center, San Rafael, CA and the current medical director of Preventive Cardiology and Wellness, Marina Del Rey Hospital, Marina Del Rey, California, and member of the Board of the American Heart Association Includes real-life case examples from the author's extensive clinical experience. Don't let stress hurt your heart. Unleash the healing benefits of The 15 Minute Heart Cure and discover the wonderful sense of focus and calm it will bring to your life.The EPUB format of this title may not be compatible for use on all handheld devices. The 15-Minute Heart Cure: The Natural Way to Release Stress and Heal Your Heart in Just Minutes a Day 5 Contents 9 Acknowledgments 11 Introduction 15 Chapter 1: The Heart Cold Facts 19 The Risk Is Widespread 20 The Costs in Lives and Dollars 21 The Triggers 22 Stress Management Improves Both Cardiac Care and Cost 23 The Data-Treatment Paradox 26 A Change of Heart 27 Is Relaxation Good? 29 The Heart: Your Body’s Engine 33 Like Ice in Their Veins 34 How This Book Works 35 Your Heart of Gold 37 Chapter 2: B-R-E-A-T-H-E 39 Breathing 41 Hearing the Conversation: The Heart and Brain Connection 42 The B-R-E-A-T-H-E Technique 46 The Benefits of B-R-E-A-T-H-E 51 Positive Thinking as Preparation for B-R-E-A-T-H-E 56 The Elements of B-R-E-A-T-H-E 58 Follow-up 64 Chapter 3: Treating and Preventing Congestive Heart Failure 65 Congested on the Highway 71 The Fallen Tree Exercise 77 Chapter 4: Treating and Preventing Heart Attacks 83 Torn 85 Flow with It 91 The River Exercise 93 The Path of Relaxation 97 Chapter 5: Treating and Preventing Arrhythmias 103 Out of Rhythm and the Blues 106 The Cherry Blossom Exercise 110 Chapter 6: Treating and Preventing Valve Disease 115 The Cardiac Cycle: Normally Functioning Heart Valves 118 A Faulty Doorway: When a Valve Fails to Open or Close Correctly 120 The Door Half Open 120 The Boulders Exercise 127 Chapter 7: B-R-E-A-T-H-E for Everyone 133 White-Coat Hypertension 135 The Perils of Repressed Anxiety 137 A General Exercise 141 Chapter 8: Fast Help: Stressed Out and Overloaded 149 The History and Evolution of Stress 150 Acute, Sudden Stress 151 Using B-R-E-A-T-H-E for Fast Help 157 Fast Help When You’re Overwhelmed 165 Chapter 9: Is Heart Disease Contagious? 169 Two People, One Heart 170 The Family Tree Exercise 178 Chapter 10: Stress and Cardiac Zebras 185 Cardiac Zebras 186 Stress: Horses and Zebras Drink from the Same Trough 205 Chapter 11: Heart-Warming Stories 207 Under the Gun 208 Bypassing the Blockage 210 Burned Out on Bereavement 210 A Fresh Start 213 Healthy Workplace, Healthy Business 214 Healthy Software 216 Greening with Envy 216 From Selling Relaxation to Experiencing It 217 Flooded 218 Hurricane and Heart Healing 219 Stress, Traffic, and the Heart 220 The Fork in the River Exercise 223 Going Under, Not Over 227 The Healing Path of Flow Exercise 228 Final Word 232 Sources 235 Suggested Reading 247 Index 249 Relax your way to a healthier heart

As an invasive cardiologist, Dr. Kennedy is skilled at restoring flow to our hearts. In The 15-Minute Heart Cure, he shows how flow in our heart is like flow in our lives, and his simple relaxation tool helps us to achieve this goal. If you, a friend, or a loved one has heart disease, flow with it. This is an outstanding book with helpful, practical exercises. I highly recommend it.
-Dean Ornish, M.D.

This is an incredible book with tools that are far reaching. Dr. Kennedy successfully distills proven data from sports psychology in order to create his B-R-E-A-T-H-E technique. In addition to healing hearts, the vital information in this book will inspire companies to innovate, students to excel in academics, and athletes to perform at their highest level. -Robert Kriegel, Ph.D., bestselling author of If It Ain't Broke . . . Break It!

The 15-Minute Heart Cure is an outstanding review of a timely and important subject, stress and heart disease. Dr. Kennedy provides a much-needed stress-relieving tool that will help heal many hearts.-Ralph Brindis, M.D., M.P.H., F.A.C.C., F.S.C.A.I., President-elect, American College of Cardiology

In The 15-Minute Heart Cure, Dr. Kennedy explains how stress triggers a fight-orflight response that can harm your cardiovascular system. He arms you with powerful guided vision and breathing techniques that help you stop stress in its tracks and keep your heart pumping as it should through every challenging situation. Dr. Kennedy also provides tools to protect your heart from common stressful triggers including difficult commutes and traffic, caring for a sick loved one, or preparing for elective surgery. This very practical guide helps you feel great, perform better under stress, and save your life, all at the same time.

A top cardiologist provides simple stress-reduction breathing techniques that can be done anywhere at any time to help heal and protect your heart and prevent and reverse four major types of heart disease. The author shows how stress can harm the cardiovascular system and provides easy-to-learn techniques for dispelling stress naturally