Having a pet dog can lower heart disease risk

London Nov 17 (IANS) Are you a dog lover? Your care and compassion for pets especially dogs can help you stay away from heart diseases.

Dog owners have a low risk of developing cardiovascular diseases that further enables them to reduce the risk of mortality a new research confirmed.

The study published in the journal Scientific Reports states that dog owners in general had a higher level of physical activity which could be counted as the one reason to prevent heart diseases. Other reasons might involve an increased well-being and social contacts or effects of the dog on the bacterial microbiome in the owner.

"Dog ownership is especially prominent as a protective factor for people living alone which is a group reported previously to be at higher risk of cardiovascular disease and death than those living in a multi-person household. Perhaps a dog may stand in as an important family member in the single households " said Mwenya Mubanga researcher at the Uppsala University in Sweden.

"The results showed that single dog owners had a 33 per cent reduction in risk of death and 11 per cent reduction in risk of cardiovascular disease during follow-up compared to single non-owners. Another interesting finding was that owners to dogs from breed groups originally bred for hunting were most protected " Mubanga added.

The research team reviewed more than 3.4 million dog owners aged between 40 to 80 years over a period of 12 years in order to study the association between dog ownership and cardiovascular health.

A total of more than 3.4 million individuals without any prior cardiovascular disease in 2001 were included in the researchers study.

Their study shows that dog owners had a lower risk of death due to cardiovascular disease.

--IANS
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