• Include vegetables or fruit at every meal
• Choose fruit for dessert or as a snack
• Almost always eat wholegrain cereal products like wholegrain bread, wholewheat pasta and brown rice over “white” alternatives
• Eat fish, beans, lentils, white meat or some dairy foods as your main sources of protein in most meals
• Eat red or processed meat only occasionally, if at all
• Reserve sweet treats and sugary drinks for special occasions rather than having them every day
• Limit foods that are high in salt and don’t add salt to meals

All activity is good activity but some has greater health benefits. This question is asking for how much “moderate” intensity activity you do.

If you’re working at “moderate” intensity , typically:

• your heart rate increases
• you feel warmer and may start to sweat
• you breathe a little faster or harder but are not out of breath
• you can carry on a conversation, taking a few extra breaths between sentences, but not be able to sing

Simply walking more quickly than normal or cycling can achieve this. Other activities like housework, gardening, dancing, exercise and sport can also have the same effect.

Note: If you can’t sing or have to take a breath between words, this can be described as “vigorous” activity. To answer this question, count every 1 minute of vigorous activity as 2 minutes of moderate activity.

If you’re not sure how much alcohol you drink in a typical week, use our “Alcohol Units” diagram to find out. Think about the type and how many drinks you have over the course of a typical week and use the diagram to calculate your average number of units per week.

If you’re still not sure answer “Don’t Know”

• You’re of white family origin and your BMI is 25 or above.
• You’re of Black African, African Caribbean, South Asian, Chinese, Middle Eastern and mixed family origin, and your BMI is 23 or above (you have a higher risk of developing some long-term conditions like Type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease at a lower BMI ).

• You have been told by a health care professional that you have diabetes (Type 1 or Type 2) or pre-diabetes
• You are taking medication for diabetes e.g. metformin

Note: If you’ve taken your own blood glucose (sugar) using an at home kit and had a high reading this is not a clinical diagnosis of pre-diabetes or diabetes and you should answer “Don’t know” to this question.

Your Heart Health Report will give you more information about this risk factor and how you can get it measured.

• You have been told by a health care professional that you have high total cholesterol, or high LDL (bad) cholesterol.
• You are taking medication to lower your cholesterol e.g. statins.

Note: If you’ve taken your own cholesterol using an at home kit and had a high reading this is not a clinical diagnosis and you should answer “Don’t know” to this question.

Your Heart Health Report will give you more information about this risk factor and how you can get it measured.

• You’ve been told by a health care professional that you have high blood pressure (hypertension)
• You take medication for high blood pressure (hypertension)

Note: If you’ve taken your own blood pressure at home without support from your GP surgery and had a high reading this is not a diagnosis of high blood pressure, which can only be done by a health care professional. You should answer “Don’t know” to this question.

Your Heart Health Report will give you more information about this risk factor and how you can get it measured.