6 Types Of People At Risk For Blood Clots

Blood clots aren't always a bad thing. When you cut yourself, your blood cells are supposed to clump together, which stops blood from leaking to places where it doesn't belong and kicks off the healing process. But sometimes clots form in places they shouldn't, and if they occur in a location where blood needs to keep flowing, that can spell trouble.

There are several major types of clots that can cause problems. Clots that block blood to your brain cause stroke, and ones that stop up your heart’s blood flow cause a heart attack. A clot that forms in your leg is called a deep vein thrombosis (DVT). DVTs can break away from their starting place and travel to your lungs. This is called a pulmonary embolism (PE), and can be very serious, even fatal.

How Diabetes May Raise Your Fatal Heart Attack Risk By 50 Percent

Your heart health depends on more than what’s going on in your chest: Having diabetes increases your chances of dying from a heart attack, a new study from the University of Leeds suggests.

After tracking more than 700,000 people for 8 years, the researchers discovered that those with diabetes were 56 percent more likely to die from a STEMI heart attack—where your coronary artery is completely blocked—and 39 percent more likely to die from a NSTEMI heart attack—where your coronary artery is partially blocked—than people without the condition.

8 Ways to Lower Your Breast Cancer Risk

Experts estimate that about one in eight women born in the U.S. today will be diagnosed with breast cancer. You may already know someone who is battling it. "Much of what causes breast cancer is not something that a woman has control over," says Dr. George Sledge, professor of medicine and chief of the division of oncology at Stanford. That's a scary thing to hear about a disease that kills nearly 40,000 U.S. women a year.