Medications are easy to take and often quick to yield results. In many cases, however, changes in diet, exercise, and other habits can be just as effective with fewer risks.

Many people rely on prescription medications to prevent or treat life-threatening illnesses and improve their health in countless ways. Even so, every drug carries risks. They can cause side effects, interact with other drugs and conditions, and even lead to such serious consequences as liver damage.

Then there’s the expense. Taking a slew of pills can cost a fortune—even with reliable health insurance.

Fortunately, most people with chronic conditions can try safer, less costly alternatives—namely diet, exercise, and other lifestyle changes. Here are some effective nondrug approaches to managing, and in some cases reversing, major illnesses.

Diabetes
The main risk factors for type 2 diabetes include obesity and lack of exercise. Not surprisingly, many studies have found that people with prediabetes—high blood sugar levels that fall just short of full-blown diabetes—can often reverse their risk by embracing a healthy diet and a regular exercise plan.

What’s more, people with diabetes who lose excess weight, eat a healthy low-calorie diet, and stick to an exercise regimen can better manage the condition.

High Blood Pressure
This condition is dangerous because it raises your risk for heart disease, stroke, kidney failure, and heart attack. However, lifestyle changes may work just as well as medications for lowering blood pressure.

Key steps: lose weight, get more exercise, and change your diet to include less sodium, red meat, and saturated fat and more fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and lean protein. Other helpful lifestyle changes include not using tobacco, limiting alcohol and caffeine, and doing relaxation or biofeedback exercises.

Cardiovascular Disease
According to the American Heart Association, eating a healthy diet, exercising regularly, and not smoking are the best weapons to fight this condition. A heart-healthy diet includes:

• A variety of fruits and vegetables
• Unrefined whole grain foods
• Twice-weekly servings of fish such as salmon, trout, and herring rich in omega-3 fatty acids
• Fewer servings of foods high in sodium, cholesterol, trans fat, and saturated fat

High Cholesterol
There’s no question statin drugs can lower LDL (bad) cholesterol levels. Even so, dietary changes can make a difference, too. Among them: eating foods with less saturated fat and more soluble fiber, legumes, nuts, plant sterols, and soy protein.

If you have low HDL (good) cholesterol, increasing your physical activity, not smoking, losing weight, and drinking alcohol in moderation can increase HDL levels. Exercise alone can raise HDL by 20 percent.

Arthritis
Losing weight won’t make arthritis go away, but it could reduce pain. Research indicates heavy people with arthritic knees who lose 5.7 percent of their weight by exercising moderately reduce their pain and increase their mobility.

Making Changes
Unhealthy habits can be hard to change. But with better health, less pain, and a longer life as your goals, you may find it easier to achieve a healthy lifestyle.

View lifestyle modifications as being just as important as any medication your doctor might prescribe. That can help you make those changes and stick with them.

By Barbara Floria, senior writer for Vitality. For more information, visit the American Academy of Family Physicians at www.familydoctor.org

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