Healthy Carolina held the “Our Heart Has No Limits” heart expo on Thursday in the Russell House, where students, faculty and staff dropped in for interactive exercise demonstrations, health screenings and giveaways.
Healthy food samples from First Lady Patricia Moore-Pastides’ cookbooks were served at the event.
“Our focus has been to encourage students to come out to the heart health walk on March 21,” Moore-Pastides said. “The way we wanted to do that was to create an incentive for them to have some fun learning about heart health and have some free food and an opportunity to win prizes.”
February is Heart Health Awareness Month, and Moore-Pastides said she wants to raise awareness of the importance of starting heart healthy habits at an early age and giving busy people easy and sustainable ideas to incorporate into their lives.
Moore-Pastides felt it was important for students to come to the event and educate themselves about matters of the heart.
“What we’ve discovered over the years is that even young people your age can already have some blockages in their arteries and be set up for heart disease,” she said. “It’s never too early to start practicing healthy habits.”
Moore-Pastides suggested students avoid smoking and tobacco, exercise every day and engage in healthy eating habits like the ones outlined in her cookbooks.
“Even cardiologists will recommend to patients who have already had a heart attack to reset their body and go in a more healthy direction,” Moore-Pastides said.
Many students came to the event to taste test the foods or win prizes, while others wished to learn more about living a healthier lifestyle.
“I personally have a VSD, so it’s like a hole in my heart, and I thought it would be cool to come out and see what it was all about,” said Rosemary Marino, a first-year early childhood education student.
Marino found it was a good opportunity to learn how to take care of her heart and establish healthy lifestyle choices early in her college career.
“I’ve learned a lot; I learned what my blood pressure was and I got a few brochures about how to take care of my body better, which is really important for a college student because we’re stressed out a lot of the time,” she said.
Healthy Carolina also offers many other opportunities including exercise buddy programs and mapped out walking trails around campus in order to encourage students to stay fit.