Page 4 - Specialist

eDITOR’s NOTE

Editorial Board Prevention is
Dr. S S Iyengar better than cure

Prof. & Head, Exercise, make lifestyle changes, cut Dr. Jamshed Dalal
Department of Cardiology, down on cholesterol, don’t smoke, find Consultant Cardiologist,
St. John’s Medical College Hospital, stress busters – these are the buzz words Wockhardt Heart Hospital, Mumbai
Bangalore. when we reach middle age. There is no
gain without pain and this is so true for disease by 2050. As we adopt a western
Dr. K M Prasanna Kumar those of us who are addicted to cigarettes, lifestyle, urban India is looking down the
Senior Prof. & Head, love our French fries and calorie-laden barrel of a gun. Indians are not genetically
Dept. of Endocrinology & Metabolism, desserts and live life in the fast lane. more prone to heart disease, it’s just that
M. S. Ramaiah Medical College & risk factors have been underestimated.
Memorial Hospital, Bangalore. According to Jack Lewin, CEO,
Dr. Sarat Chandra K American College of Cardiology, over The Indian Council of Medical
Additional Professor, the last eight years, there has been a 29 Research and Apollo Hospitals will soon
Dept. of Cardiology, per cent reduction in sudden cardiac bring out India-specific guidelines that
Nizam’s Institute of Medical Sciences, deaths in USA. That was achieved will bring in new and lower threshold
Hyderabad. through a combination of using advance levels for risk factors such as diabetes,
imaging techniques, interventions and hypertension and lipid profiles that
Medical Accuracy prevention strategies. Banning smoking should be the mantra for every Indian
in public places, encouraging people to trying to beat heart disease. With modern
Dr. Yogesh Kothari periodically test their BP, cholesterol technology like cardiac imaging and
Interventional Cardiologist and and blood sugar in combination with other non-invasive and invasive cardiac
Electrophysiologist, Trinity Heart Foundation, pharmacology and technology help diagnosis, it’s not the end of the road.
Bangalore. reduce the number of people suddenly
dropping dead of a heart attack. They say don’t trouble trouble, until
Content Support trouble troubles you. But that may not
There was a time when women be a good thing if heart disease is what
Amrisha Sinha, Anand Chakroborty, were thought to be beyond the ambit of you are talking about because catching
Mary Jannet C J, Rashmi Sequeira, heart disease, but guess what, Women’s the disease early will save you much
Spurthi Naik Lib may have brought in many benefits, heartache and expense.
but it brought heart disease too on their
Art & Graphics doorstep. Post-menopause, when the body
does not produce estrogen, it’s almost a
Aruvin Kumar D, Lakshmikantha K level playing feild.
Nagaraj P S, Shivkumar M R
Shruti S Hegde In India, the bad news is that the
western parameters used to test risk may
Ezine not hold good anymore and like diabetes,
which is of epidemic proportions, cardiac
P Umamaheshwar Rao, P C Nazar disease is a sleeping monster waiting
to wake up. Heart disease risks in the
Circulation country are four times higher than in the
west and six to eight times higher than
K K Cariappa, Naveen Krishnaraju in Asian countries. According to WHO,
Prithvi Rai, Priyanka Verma India would be the world capital of heart
Raghuveera Kamath

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JANUARY 2009