Dr Paddy Barrett

Exercise is probably the single best way to extend lifespan. You need to exercise like your life depends on it. Because it does. Here's why. 👇🧵 /1

Three things strongly linked to lower dementia risk: • Fitness • Metabolic health • Blood pressure control

What rarely gets said about heart health: Most people don’t need exotic biomarkers — they need to stop ignoring the obvious ones.

It's amazing how much your cardiovascular risk plummets when you simply: Don't Smoke Maintain Normal Blood Pressure Keep LDL Cholesterol as low as possible for as long as possible. Get those right, and you are most of the way there.

Cholesterol risk isn’t complicated. Higher exposure. For longer. Equals more plaque. We just keep pretending it’s controversial.

For me, it's not about 'Health' It's about a life well lived. None of us get out of this alive. Everyone's time here is limited. My goal is to live a long life with my physical and cognitive capacities intact. And use that precious time in the most meaningful way I can.

Most people think diabetes starts when their A1c hits 42. It doesn't. By the time your A1c creeps into the "pre-diabetic" range, insulin resistance has likely been silently damaging your cardiovascular system, your brain, and your liver for years.

Atherosclerosis is a disease of exposure and time. Lower exposure early. Keep time on your side.

In many heart attack patients, the culprit artery had <50% narrowing before rupture. Heart attacks are about plaque instability, not just obstruction.

Autopsy studies show fatty streaks in arteries as early as the teens and 20s. Atherosclerosis starts far earlier than most people think.

In the SPRINT trial, targeting SBP <120 mmHg reduced cardiovascular events by 25% and all cause mortality by 27%. Good blood pressure control saves lives.

Every 1 mmol/L reduction in LDL cholesterol lowers major vascular events by about 20–25%. Lower LDL → lower cardiovascular risk.

I’d rather have high aerobic fitness at 70 than a perfect supplement stack at 40.

The easiest way to lower your dementia risk is to get fitter. Not because exercise is trendy. Because higher fitness is consistently linked to lower dementia risk.

The biggest risk factor for heart disease is not what you think. It's time. You cannot modify time. But you can use it to your advantage by acting earlier.

The goal of cholesterol lowering therapy isn’t just lowering cholesterol numbers. It’s reducing plaque progression and stabilizing lesions.

Many patients focus on stress tests. But coronary artery disease is primarily about plaque biology, not treadmill performance. You can have entirely stress with multivessel coronary artery disease.

The most dangerous heart disease plan is doing nothing until symptoms appear.

Your arteries respond to what you do repeatedly.