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Heart Disease
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Definition of Heart Disease
Heart disease is an umbrella term for a number of different diseases which affect the heart and is the leading cause of death in the United States as of 2007.
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Holiday Heart Disease
A busy day, a big meal and maybe an eggnog or two. It sounds like a recipe for a festive holiday season, but experts say to celebrate with caution.
A report from the Associated Press says December and January are the deadliest months for heart disease.
"People are off work doctors offices are closed and many family and friends are in town visiting so we definitely see our volume increase over the holidays."
Dr. Debra Williams says patients come to Gulf Coast Medical Center for a variety of reasons.
"Typical medical illnesses we're moving into pneumonia season. People eat a little too much party a little too much."
One of the biggest reasons people go to the hospital is because of heart disease.
Busy revelers tend to skip their medications, forget them when traveling, or are unable to get refills far from home.
You may also want to watch those salty snacks.
Too much salt causes fluid retention and makes your heart have to pump faster.
You'll also want to be c
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Holiday Heart Disease
A busy day, a big meal and maybe an eggnog or two. It sounds like a recipe for a festive holiday season, but experts say to celebrate with caution.
A report from the Associated Press says December and January are the deadliest months for heart disease.
"People are off work doctors offices are closed and many family and friends are in town visiting so we definitely see our volume increase over the holidays."
Dr. Debra Williams says patients come to Gulf Coast Medical Center for a variety of reasons.
"Typical medical illnesses we're moving into pneumonia season. People eat a little too much party a little too much."
One of the biggest reasons people go to the hospital is because of heart disease.
Busy revelers tend to skip their medications, forget them when traveling, or are unable to get refills far from home.
You may also want to watch those salty snacks.
Too much salt causes fluid retention and makes your heart have to pump faster.
You'll also want to be c
Read the Article
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New Omega-3 test better identifies heart disease risk
Doctors could soon have access to a new, more accurate test, the 'Omega-3 Index', to identify patients at risk of heart disease.
US and German researchers have developed the test, which measures the level of Omega-3 fatty acids in a patient's blood.
The test will be unveiled in Sydney today.
The executive director of the Omega-3 Centre, Wendy Morgan, says the Index is an improvement on other blood pressure and cholesterol tests.
"The test can be done now, it's just quite a lengthy procedure to do the analysis so the rapid analysis technique is being worked on very hard so I would hope within a few months that would be available in Australia," she said.
She says the test is more accurate than existing cholesterol and blood pressure tests.
"It's very much diet-related, so if your level is low you're at a higher risk of a heart attack, if it's higher you're at a much reduced risk of a heart attack," she said.
"So if you know it's low, then you know you must do somethi
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Some myths about health women could do without
CHENNAI: Social Welfare Minister Poongothai Aladi Aruna on Tuesday called for launching lifestyle counselling and health education for women “who have a poor record of looking after themselves.”
Formally releasing a booklet on “Heart Risks And Women” brought out by Apollo Hospitals, Dr. Poongothai said the supposition that ischemic heart disease was a concern of men was a myth against increasing evidence showing women to be equally at risk for coronary artery disease.
Emphasising the need for women to keep their weight under control through diet and exercise, Dr. Poongothai pointed out that obesity, which was an important risk factor for heart disease, had become a major health concern in urban centres, thanks to increased urbanisation. The data from the latest National Family Health Survey showed that obesity/overweight was not only prevalent among urban women but was also increasing, she said.
Pointing out that a majority of diabetics were obese, the Minister said this combination was all the more dangerous. According to projections, the number of diabetes patients in India was expected to grow to 57 million in the next two decades, she said.
The Minister released the booklet by handing over the first copy to Nina Reddy, executive director, Hotel Savera.
Ms. Nina Reddy urged women to “take responsibility for your wellbeing.” She recommended everyday exercise, particularly cardio-workouts, that promoted emotional wellbeing and enabled women to be socially active.
Preetha Reddy, managing director, Apollo, said the booklet aimed to make women more aware of the need to take their health more seriously. Traditionally, women have tended to least prioritise their own health issues and that situation had to be reversed.
P. Ramachandran, cardiologist, said contrary to the misnotion, women were as much at risk of suffering heart attack and heart disease as men. In fact, heart disease is the leading cause of death among women over 65 years.
The key differentiator was that women were prone to develop heart disease some 15-20 years later than the mean age onset in men as a consequence of the protective mechanism of menstrual hormones wearing off. Pointing that there was a high possibility of missing a diagnosis of a heart ailment in women as classical ECG patterns were non-specific, Dr. Ramachandran urged women to have the first signs of breathlessness or fatigue evaluated by a clinician. Importantly, modern medicine had started to evaluate psychosocial factors such as depression and stress as risk factors for ischemic heart disease, the cardiologist said.
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7 ways to prevent heart disease
Heart disease will kill two-thirds of the 21 million Americans who have diabetes. So the American Heart Association is leading a national campaign to raise awareness about the link between type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease. They have provided tips for maintaining a healthy lifestyle, and we've added a few more.
1. Keep active. Even 30 minutes of moderate physical activity five days a week can help prevent diabetes and decrease your risk of heart disease.
2. Maintain a healthy body weight, and be especially careful about carrying extra weight around the waist as opposed to the hips. Try to maintain a waist measurement of less than 40 inches for men and less than 35 inches for women.
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3. Keep your cholesterol levels in check. If your numbers are high, talk to your doctor about ways to lower them.
4. Monitor your blood sugar levels. Keeping your diabetes under control is important in preventing heart disease, but also other complications.
5. Don't smoke. Smoking doubles your risk of getting heart disease.
6. Opt for a healthy lifestyle. This includes eating a healthy, balanced diet.
7. Work with your doctor. Continue an open dialogue with your physician and be persistent until you find a treatment plan that works for you.
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Heart artery deposits risky even in low-risk women
NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - In middle-aged and older women considered to be at low risk for heart disease, calcium build-up in their heart arteries, an indicator of artery-clogging plaque, predicts the development of heart disease and heart-related events like chest pain, heart attack and stroke, new research shows.
The findings, which appear in the latest issue of Archives of Internal Medicine, come from a study of 3601 women, between 45 and 84 years of age. Excluding women older than 79 years and those with diabetes, 90 percent were considered to be at low risk for heart disease, based on the standard risk score, which includes things like a person's age, cholesterol and blood pressure levels, smoking habits and diabetes.
However, 32 percent of "low-risk" women had calcium deposits in their coronary arteries, report Dr. Susan G. Lakoski and colleagues from Wake Forest School of Medicine in Winston-Salem, North Carolina.
Over an average of 3.75 years, 24 of the low-risk women had heart events (such as heart attack and heart pain) and 34 had a cardiovascular disease event, including heart events, stroke or death.
According to Lakoski and colleagues, in "low risk" women, the presence of coronary artery calcium, as seen on CT scans, increased the odds of heart disease and heart-disease events by 6.5- and 5.2-fold, respectively, over the course of the study.
Advanced coronary artery calcium identified women with an especially high risk of heart-related events.
"The study findings raise the important question whether coronary artery calcium screening is warranted among at least some women who are currently classified as 'low risk'," two heart doctors note in a written editorial on the study.
At this point, the editorialists say there is not enough evidence to support coronary artery calcium screening in low-risk women and they call for further studies to better identify who would benefit from such screening.
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Raised Heart Disease Risk For 'otherwise Low-risk' Women With Calcium In Coronary Arteries
The authors explain that the Framingham risk score is the most common approach for assessing a person's likelihood of developing coronary heart disease during the next ten years - the assessment takes into account such factors as the patient's age, blood pressure and cholesterol levels.
If an person in the USA has a risk of under 10% during the coming decade he/she is considered as low-risk - a high risk person would be one whose likelihood is at least 20%. About 95% of all American women under 70 are considered low-risk, and consequently do not qualify for aggressive management risk factors. "Nevertheless, most women will ultimately die of heart disease, suggesting that the Framingham risk score alone does not adequately stratify women in ways that would be useful for targeted preventive interventions," the researchers say.
Susan G. Lakoski, M.D., M.S., Wake Forest School of Medicine, Winston-Salem, N.C., and team looked at 3,601 women, aged 45-84 in this study. The study started in 2000. CT (computed topographic) scans determined their scores for coronary artery calcium. A high score - meaning significant calcium deposits are presents - are not included in the Framingham risk score. In 2000 details on the women's medical history, body measurements and laboratory tests were also taken. They were all interviewed by telephone every 9-12 months about any subsequent cardiovascular diagnoses or admissions to hospital.
According to the Framingham risk score, 90% (2,684) of the women were considered low-risk. However, 32% of them had detectable amounts of calcium in their coronary arteries. During the following 3.75 years (average) 24 of the low-risk individuals had heart events - a risk of 0.9% - and 34 had a cardiovascular disease event, such as a heart event, stroke or death - 1.3% risk.
"Compared with women with no detectable coronary artery calcium, low-risk women with a coronary artery calcium score greater than zero were at increased risk for coronary heart disease and cardiovascular disease events."
Nearly 5% of the low-risk women had a score of at least 300, meaning they had advanced coronary artery calcium. They ran a 6.7% risk of a heart event, as well as an 8.6% risk of a cardiovascular event during the 3.75-year follow-up.
The researchers wrote "These data shed new light on cardiovascular disease risk and the modalities to evaluate and treat middle-aged and older women. This study also provides novel data in support of the 2007 guidelines on cardiovascular disease prevention in women, suggesting that women with coronary artery calcium are at potentially higher risk than a Framingham risk score classification would suggest."
To determine which low-risk women should be screened for coronary artery calcium or treated more aggressively further studies are needed with longer follow-up periods, the researchers conclude
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“Incidence of kidney disease very high in India”
NEW DELHI: Dr. D. S. Rana, chairman of the Department of Nephrology at Sir Ganga Ram Hospital here, who took over as the new president of the Indian Society of Nephrology (ISN) here on Saturday, said diabetes and hypertension are two major causes for kidney failure and optimum treatment of these two diseases can reduce the incidence of end-stage kidney failure.
Speaking at the 38th annual conference of ISN after taking over as its president, Dr. Rana said the incidence of kidney disease was very high in India.
Almost 1.5 lakh new patients of end-stage kidney failure, who require dialysis and kidney transplantation, get added to the pre-existing “pool” every year.
The ISN felicitated Dr. V. N. Acharya, an eminent nephrologist from Mumbai, with a life-time achievement award.
At least 700 kidney specialists, including national and international experts, took part in the conference which focused on “incidence, prevention and efficient management of cardiovascular complication of chronic kidney diseases”.
The experts pointed out that chronic kidney disease was a major cardiovascular risk factor.
They said many patients of chronic kidney diseases die of heart diseases before they even reach a stage of end-stage kidney failure.
It was advisable, therefore, for the patients of kidney failure to take optimal treatment for prevention of heart diseases, they concluded.
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Coronary Artery Calcium May Raise Women's Heart Risk
MONDAY, Dec. 10 (HealthDay News) -- About 5 percent of women considered at low risk for heart disease still face potential cardiovascular problems because of calcium buildup in their arteries, a new study suggests.
"Previous studies have demonstrated that calcium is predictive of coronary artery disease in other populations," said study lead author Dr. Susan G. Lakoski, a cardiology fellow at the Wake Forest University School of Medicine. "We traditionally have the question of looking at low-risk people."
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The standard method of measuring heart risk is the so-called Framingham risk score, which is based on findings of a decades-long study of residents of a Massachusetts town. The score includes such factors as age, cholesterol levels, diabetes, smoking and obesity, but not calcium.
Lakoski and her colleagues used computerized tomography scans of the chest to measure coronary artery calcium in 3,601 women between 45 and 84 years of age. Ninety percent of the women were considered "low risk," because their Framingham scores indicated they had less than a 10 percent chance of a cardiac event in 10 years. (High risk is a test score of 20 percent or higher.)
Over an average of the next 3.75 years, 24 of the low-risk women had heart events -- such as heart pain or a heart attack -- and 34 of the women had a so-called cardiovascular disease event, including heart events, stroke or death, the study found.
Women with the highest calcium scores were especially at risk, Lakoski said. "They had an 8.6 percent risk of a coronary event," she said.
The findings are published in the Dec. 10/24 issue ofArchives of Internal Medicine.
Lakoski said it's probably too early to consider routine testing of coronary artery calcium to gauge heart risk for women. The number of study participants was small, and further research is needed, she said.
Still, Dr. Suzanne Steinbaum, director of Women and Heart Disease at Lenox Hill Hospital in New York City, called the study findings important. "The risk of heart disease in women is often underestimated, because they develop heart disease later than men, often at age 65. By measuring calcium, we can show that they might actually be at higher risk, and that is important because they can benefit from preventive measures."
And heart-risk estimates for women based on traditional risk factors might be misleading because of societal changes, Steinbaum said. "Younger women are developing heart disease earlier than we originally thought," she said. "This is where calcium might be an important modality in classifying risk."
A test for coronary artery calcium is easily done, Steinbaum said, but health insurance companies don't currently pay for it.
While there are no known measures to reduce coronary artery calcium, a woman who knows of its presence can still take preventive measures, Lakoski said. "She needs to offset it with lifestyle measures that affect risk factors that are modifiable, such as cholesterol,"
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P.E. classes focus on getting kids going
BLOOMINGTON -- “I’ve got a lemon!” Fifth-grader Blake Cochran, 10, picked up the plastic lemon from among facsimiles of food and note cards with food names written on them. | Photo gallery | Fit kids page
The items were at center court in the gymnasium of Unit 5’s Pepper Ridge Elementary School on Bloomington’s southwest side.
Cochran ran to where his three teammates were hurriedly sorting other plastic and note card representations of food into their correct categories in a food guide pyramid on a poster on the gym floor.
“So, 25 jumping jacks,” Cochran said. He and teammates Jacob Belmar, Cristina Sheehan and Lucas Loy, all fifth-graders, started jumping.
They also picked up crackers and croissants and did 15 pushups for each one; hot dogs, catfish and eggs meant 30 line jumps for each. Doritos required two laps and it was back to 25 jumping jacks each for pears and eggplant.
“Once they’re in here, we want to get them moving as fast as they can,” said physical education teacher Terri McCullick.
P.E. classes at Pepper Ridge are among progressive physical education classes at an increasing number of Central Illinois schools. The goal is to get kids moving and to educate them about fitness and nutrition — all with an eye toward combating childhood obesity and diseases that obesity could bring later in life.
Nutrition is integrated into physical education to help teach children about the importance of eating healthy and being aware of serving sizes, McCullick said. Exercises are kept simple and are designed to keep kids moving and their heart rates up.
Classes at Pepper Ridge, taught by McCullick and Lucas Lopez, are representative of the New P.E., a nationwide movement that is called My P.E. (Moving Youth through Physical Education) in Bloomington-Normal.
My P.E. classes focus on:
• Health and disease preven-tion rather than sports skills.
• Accelerating students’ heart rate to strengthen their heart rather than focusing on point scores.
• Keeping moving rather than waiting your turn.
• Using heart rate monitors and other equipment to measure heart rate, body fat, blood pressure, strength, flexibility and fitness, rather than using the Presidential Fitness Test.
• Tracking students’ measurements over time so they are evaluated against themselves rather than classmates.
• Teaching healthy lifestyles and that a variety of activities, ranging from playing sports and games to dancing, can burn calories, accelerate heart rate and be continued into adulthood.
Dale Brown, an Illinois State University professor of kinesi-ology and recreation, has been working with local schools for about five years to update their P.E. programs. ISU and the American Heart Association are involved in the My P.E. movement that now involves — to varying degrees — most of the high schools and junior highs in Bloomington-Normal, and a few of the elementary schools.
Fitness portfolios, to track students’ health over time, are being used in some high schools and junior highs, and Brown wants to get them in more buildings. The idea is to track students’ fitness levels to determine how their body responds to activity, and to identify early warning signs of obesity and disease, including hypertension, heart disease and diabetes.
“I like it,” said Cochran, of Bloomington. “I have to sit in a chair all day long. In P.E., I get to move. I want to run and do pushups and sit-ups, so I get to do all that stuff in P.E.”
Cochran was among several fifth-graders who spoke with the Pantagraph after a recent P.E. class. All the students said they like the class because it keeps them moving and they learn.
“We learned what foods go in which part of the food pyramid and which are healthy and not healthy,” said Analeese Monla, 10, of Bloomington.
Loy, also 10 and of Bloomington, said, “We learned about foods that keep us healthy.”
“And we get to exercise, too!” Monla said. “It’s fun because, in our group, we can move around all over the place, and we learn things to keep our body healthy.”
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Study: Monthly Fasting May Help Heart
Mormons have less heart disease - something doctors have long chalked up to their religion's ban on smoking. New research suggests that another of their "clean living" habits also may be helping their hearts: fasting for one day each month.
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Scientists Link Childhood Obesity to Heart Disease
Children who are overweight are at significant risk of developing heart disease as adults. That's the conclusion of two studies published in this week's New England Journal of Medicine, which predicts what experts have long suspected about the health hazards of obesity in kids. VOA's Jessica Berman reports.
The largest of the two studies was conducted in Denmark by Jennifer Baker and colleagues at the University of Copenhagen.
The investigators took the height and weight data of virtually every school child born in the Danish city between 1930 and 1976, or about 288,000 children, and followed their health through 2001.
The researchers discovered that the more the children weighed, the greater their risk of developing heart disease as adults, including fatal heart attack. The risk was highest among the heaviest children in each age group.
David Ludwig is a weight consultant at Children's Hopsital in Boston, Massachusetts. Ludwig says the results are wake-up call.
"The highest weight catagory that they used in this Danish study would barely qualify as overweight, would barely make it out of the normal weight catagory used in the United States for children," said David Ludwig. "So, the bottom line is this generation of obese children is facing huge risks for a lifetime of cardiovascular disease and other weight-related problems as they age."
The second study, by researchers at the University of Calfornia at San Francisco, used a computer model to estimate how many more heart disease cases there would be in the United States as a result of adolescent obesity.
Experts say that previous studies have found that three million people between ages of 12 and 19 have heart disease by the time they are 35 to 50-years-old.
Using a computer model and plugging in weight data from obese adolescents from the year 2000, researchers estimated there would be more than a 100,000 extra cases of heart disease by 2035, which is an increase of 16 percent, and heart disease deaths could increase by as much as 19 percent for the 35 to 50 age group.
Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo is an assistant professor of medicine at the University of California and the study's lead author.
"We were really surprised at the magnitude by the magnitude of how large this increase was," said Kirsten Bibbins-Domingo. "And it really suggests that we really have to work now to prevent children from becoming overweight because this is going to have an impact well into adulthood."
The good news, according to David Ludwig of Boston's Children's Hospital, is the health problems of obesity are reversible.
"It's not unprecedented to see even adolescents with type two diabetes, which can become a permanent condition, reverse it which potentially long term cure just with significant weight loss," he said. "So, it's really never too late. But
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The 4th Partners International Cardiovascular Conference Charts Path to Reduce Heart Disease
The 4th Partners Int’l Cardiovascular Conference is held in Dubai this week, bringing together the world’s leading authorities on cardiovascular disease to try to reduce its incidence across the Middle East and Africa.
“2008:A New Era for Cardiovascular Risk Reduction,” organised by Partners International Medical Services, is being held under the patronage of H. E. Humaid Mohamed Al Qutami, Health Minister of the UAE and is supported by an educational grant from Pfizer.
Predictions for the next two decades suggest a tripling of deaths from strokes and coronary heart disease (CHD) in the Middle East and Africa, a rate that exceeds that of any other region apart from Latin America.
As a result, the UAE Ministry of Health – along with the Ministries of every GCC nation – have made battling the incidence and impact of heart disease a key strategic target and are working to encourage greater coordination and cooperation between physicians across the region.
H.E. Dr. Ali Ahmed Bin Shakar, Undersecretary, Ministry of Health, UAE said: “Cooperation between international, regional and local specialists provides one important strand in our battle against cardiovascular diseases. Important new discoveries are being made everyday, both in terms of advancing the treatments available for patients, and ensuring that people are being advised correctly to help them avoid developing these serious diseases.”
“This event is an important platform for exchanging knowledge in this area, and we are proud to provide our support and expertise in helping it to achieve its objectives,” he added.
The conference is set to attract 200 leading specialists from across the Middle East and Africa, including some of the top experts in the field of cardiovascular health.
In an unprecedented move for a conference of this size and importance, sessions will also be broadcast live across the region via the internet to 500 pre-registered physicians.
This pioneering web-cast has been designed to ensure that the breakthrough research and new studies are shared with a broad cross-section of doctors, particularly those in remote locations, so that the benefits reach the widest possible patient population.
The objective of the meeting is to provide a forum for discussion of the latest data on the management of global cardiovascular risk. Essentially, the two-day scientific program will combine lectures and interactive case studies presented by opinion leaders in the field of cardiovascular diseases and provide a forum for discussion between faculty and audience.
Gilbert Mudge, MD, course organiser and member of the Harvard Faculty, said: “Part of the aim of this conference is to emphasize the newest advances in prevention and treatment of cardiovascular disease that are of central long term consequence to this region of the word.”
“In particular, we will cover all aspects of risk reduction, including the most innovative therapy for smoking cessation. An international faculty will include physicians from Massachusetts General Hospital, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and Harvard Medical School as well as representatives from London and the Middle East,” he added.
“Pfizer is a long-term partner with Partners International Medical Services, as part of our commitment to helping drive research and increase awareness of recent advances and treatment updates,” said Dr. Ahmed El Hakim, Director of Policy and External Affairs, Pfizer Middle East.
Both the Middle East and Africa are seeing an upsurge in chronic illnesses, resulting from both demographic changes and lifestyle issues. Since 1980, obesity rates have tripled or more in some parts of the Middle East and Africa.
According to World Health Organization (WHO) estimates, 16.7 million people around the globe die of CVD each year - some 29 percent of all deaths globally.
Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of death in the United Arab Emirates (41 percent) and conditions relating to heart disease are prevalent throughout the Middle East. The prevalence of hypertension in Kuwait, for example, is 26.3 percent, compared to 32.1 percent in Qatar, 45.3 percent in Egypt and 33 percent in Oman.
Photo caption: (Left to Right) Sherif Bakir, MD Consultant Cardiologist, Shaikh Khalifa Medical City, Abu Dhabi; Gilbert Mudge, MD Associate Professor, Harvard Medical School Senior Cardiologist, Senior Medical Advisor, Partners International; H.E. Ali Ahmed Bin Shakar, MD, Undersecretary, Ministry of Health UAE; Zeydan Abuissa, MD, General Manager, Pfizer, Arab Peninsula States; Andrew Eisenhauer, MD Director Cardiac Quality Assurance, Partners Healthcare
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Childhood obesity increases adulthood heart disease risk
BEIJING, Dec. 6 (Xinhuanet) -- A new study found that obesity in childhood will substantially increase future risk of heart attack and other cardiac events, media reported Thursday.
The study published in the New England Journal of Medicine showed that the greater the increase in the children's weight, the higher their risk of suffering heart disease in their future life.
The study also said that the obesity ratio would increase by 5 to 12 percent for the boys who are overweight now and 2 to 12 percent for the girls by 2020 in the United States, which means more heart disease, diabetes and high blood pressure at a younger age.
"If we don't take steps to reverse course, the children of each successive generation seem destined to be fatter and sicker than their parents," said David Ludwig of Children's Hospital Boston in a commentary in the New England Journal of Medicine.
More than 9 million children in the United States are overweight now, and by 2035, the prevalence of heart disease will have increased by 5 to 16 percent, researchers estimated.
"My colleagues and I have predicted that pediatric obesity may shorten life expectancy in the United States by 2 to 5 years by mid-century -- an effect equal
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