You know that you cannot live without the beating of your heart. But did you know that during the day your heart makes about 100,000 contractions, and during your life - more than 2.5 billion? At the same time, it pumps about 160 million liters of blood.

Here are some more amazing facts about your heart:

1. The heart is an amazing organ. Its weight in an adult is almost 300 grams, and in a newborn child, it is only 22 grams, which is about 0.8 percent of the total body weight.

2. To find out how big your heart is, just clench your hand into a fist. The size of the heart will be almost the same. And if you take a tennis ball in your hand and squeeze it with maximum force, you will find out how much effort your heart muscle makes to pump blood through the body every second.

3. Unsuccessful exercise may indicate a heart problem. If several workouts in a row you are unable to achieve normal results, see your doctor. This could be a sign of heart muscle problems.

4. "Broken Heart" is not just a poetic saying. When you are stressed and suffer from an emotional trauma, the body produces hormones that overstrain the heart muscle. This can lead to palpitations and even a heart attack. Therefore, the expression "all diseases from the nerves" can be easily applied to cardiovascular diseases. Don't be overstressed and your heart will be healthy.

5. Sex is good for the heart. According to the American Journal of Cardiology, men who have sex at least twice a week have a lower risk of heart disease than those who do it once a month or less.

6. Laughter is good too. It lowers the stress hormone cortisol, which reduces inflammation in the arteries and raises good cholesterol.

7. The heart remembers everything. Childhood trauma can lead to heart problems in the future. For example, scientists at Virginia Tech and the University of Toronto have found that children whose relatives are imprisoned have a higher risk of having a heart attack.

8. A woman's heart beats faster than a man's. Perhaps that is why women are more sensitive and emotional.

9. It has been scientifically proven that people with higher levels of education have less heart disease. This is associated with an attentive attitude to their health.

10. Heart scars do not go away. Unlike other organs, the heart cannot heal itself. That is why it is so important to carry out timely treatment for heart attacks. The damage to the heart is increasing every minute.

11. New methods of treatment. Scientists at Carnegie Mellon University have 3D printed arteries and whole hearts of embryos. Other scientists have succeeded in printing adult stem cells. Such replacements may be implanted in patients.

12. Excess weight harms the heart at any age. Signs of heart disease, including thickening of its walls, are observed even in overweight children as young as 8 years old. What can we say about adults?

13. Heart disease and even operations on it do not mean the end of a healthy life. Doctors report patients who, after successful treatment, go in for a triathlon and run marathons on a par with ordinary people.