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HowToPreventHeartDisease.com |
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Hidden Heart Disease Revealed By Small Ultrasound Scanners! Do you know that the first symptom of one-third of heart disease sufferers is dropping dead of a heart attack? Therefore, there is a great need to find a non-invasive and safe way to identify early and treat these people, especially those who do not have signs but have risk of heart disease. During Oct 2007, pocket-sized ultrasound machines weighing less than 1 kilogram hit the market. Some of these devices can make images of neck arteries, which are linked to heart arteries that cannot be seen easily. Clogging in the neck vessels is probably a good indication that those around the heart probably are clogged as well. This would signal doctors to carry out treatment or do more testing. The test may be especially good for women, who often have few or none of the traditional signs. For example, with the help of ultrasound machines, an athletic mother having normal cholesterol and blood pressure but a troubling family history of heart attacks was found to have a big clog in the main artery from her heart to her head. Her doctor immediately put her on medications to lower her risk of a heart attack or stroke. The ultrasound screening involves checking for plaque and measuring the thickness of the wall of the main neck artery. Normal thickness does vary by age, race and sex, and charts do give doctors detailed guidance. When the arteries are too thick, the risk for heart attack is much higher.
In the past, only ultrasound specialists could do these tests, which were then handed over to and analyzed by a radiologist. This means that patients are required to make an appointment at a hospital or ultrasound centre, and then a return trip to their primary doctor for results. It seems that the new portable ultrasound devices are changing all these. There is no doubt that the new ultrasound machines offer a relatively cheap and painless way to screen people with no symptoms of hidden heart problems. Nevertheless, there are potential downsides too. Many more family doctors without extensive training would have to perform the testing with these mini machines. This might send some patients who have no threatening causes for unnecessary treatment. Though some patients might be motivated to quit smoking, lose weight or go on cholesterol-lowering statin drugs, many others might also be treated unnecessarily, and hence have side effects from that. To many doctors, these portable devices have more merits than perils. Some doctors have even equated portable ultrasound devices to a mammogram of the heart. This is because if doctors discover something suspicious, they could first refer their patients to specialists for more extensive tests before deciding on whether or how to treat their patients. On the other hand, the American Heart Association and other major cardiology groups agree that ultrasound testing with big, conventional machines can certainly help doctors determine heart risk in certain patients. However, they do not endorse widespread screening with the smaller portable devices because there is still a lack of evidence of benefit.
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