People who fall into the secondary prevention group (heart attack survivors or those with diagnosed heart disease) for which aspirin is recommended should take one low-dose (81 mg) aspirin daily. If you don’t have low-dose aspirin, you can break a regular aspirin in half — but most people find it more convenient to keep both low-dose and regular aspirin on hand.

For those without a history of heart disease, instead of a daily dose I recommend taking aspirin just two or three times a week.

It’s best to take the aspirin in the morning, as that’s when most heart attacks occur. And it should be taken with food, so breakfast time is perfect.

If you think you could be having a heart attack, chew and swallow two regular (325 mg) aspirin to get it working in your system quickly. Uncoated pills work best, but use any that you have on hand. If you only have low-dose aspirin, take about five.

Lastly, talk to your doctor about the use of aspirin if you are on a prescription blood thinner. A study published in March found that 5.7 percent of patients who experienced a bleeding incident were on both a prescription blood thinner and aspirin, compared to 3.3 percent who were on the blood thinner alone.