Sailing through metabolic syndrome with a health savings account
One of the greatest diseases that America has every faced is now called as ‘metabolic syndrome’. It’s called a syndrome and not a disease because it is a collection of disease symptoms that attack a person at one time. The symptoms can include excessive fat around the abdomen, extremely high blood pressure readings, low levels of HDL cholesterol, high fasting blood sugar, high LDL cholesterol, and even elevated levels of triglyceride in the body.
As a result of this disease, a lot of Americans are carrying health plans with high deductibles along with their health savings accounts. Health savings accounts are accounts which let a person put aside a certain amount of money every time period for their future health needs which might result in unforeseen expenses. These deposits are not taxed for all withdrawals which are made for medical purposes. And they are also tax deferred which means that if you manage to stay healthy into the maturity date of the savings account, you can have a healthy nest egg to retire upon by the time you reach your retirement age.
Insulin resistance is the main symptom of metabolic syndrome. This is a very common occurrence in most people. Insulin is basically a hormone that is released by the body which helps in digesting sugar or carbohydrates. If you are diagnosed with insulin resistance that means your blood cells will just not absorb the sugar. And this will stress your pancreas into producing more and more insulin to help the absorption process. If your pancreas is not able to produce enough amounts of insulin, you will end up becoming diabetic. This is a very common ailment that people even in their late 20’s seem to be getting.
Metabolic syndrome can be avoided totally if you follow a healthy lifestyle. If you manage to lead a healthy lifestyle, you will also avoid cardiovascular disease, cancer, stroke and other life threatening conditions. The mechanism behind getting afflicted with metabolic syndrome has not totally been discovered. But lots of studies have managed to establish that several changes in lifestyle can result in your health improving by leaps and bounds.
Exercise is a classic example of leading a healthy lifestyle. Take some time off to move and shake your body every day. This will result in savings that will add up to several thousands of dollars in the long run. Bring about a change in your daily diet. Eating food with low glycemic content can help you reduce your chances of having diabetes. Food that raises your blood sugar levels very fast is called high glycemic food. This can include all white foods like rice, potatoes and sugar. Low glycemic foods include fruits, greens, fish and lean meat. And try your best to eat the right fat. Eating fish oil, avocados, and milk is supposed to be a good source of fat. Avoid transfat in processed foods.
Reading an article is just about gaining information. Putting it into action is the only way to bring about changes in your life which will result in better health in the long run. There are many drugs in the market to counter metabolic syndrome, but again it’s about spending money on something that you could have avoided all together. HSA’s or health savings accounts have helped many people avoid going broke in the later stages of their life.
Put aside a little money every year to help you in your later stages. If you do this, you are being a responsible citizen because you will not burden your government if there is a public free health plan in place. And HSA’s are not like health insurance where you will not get good interest on your money. But they are like conventional savings accounts and the only difference is in their tax incentives. The advantage of having a HSA is that you will not only safeguard your health, you will also have a large amount of money stashed up when you retire. Metabolic syndrome can be avoided by making changes in one’s lifestyle. But it can be sustained by investing your money in an HSA.
