Call us at: 239.263.0014
Someone is waiting to take your call
Someone is waiting to take your call
news
The Best Heart Test? Move over, cholesterol. Your calcium score ...
Post Date: June 26, 2006Author: Chuck Marvin - FORTUNE Magazine
Web Address
The Best Heart Test? Move over, cholesterol. Your calcium score could matter more.
As doctors become more adept at predicting heart attacks, they're paying increasing attention to calcium, whose presence can signal trouble long before a patient feels sick. Atherosclerosis, the most common form of heart disease, occurs when placque accumulates in the walls of coronary arteries........ calcium is a marker for plaque." The problem with cholesterol is that it incorrectly measures health risks- you are looking at somebody's blood to see what their arteries are doing," says Dr. Shelton Thomas of Virginia Cardiovascular Specialists in Richmond." 30% of people who have heart attacks have normal cholesterol. But if you have normal cholesterol and a high calcium score, then we know you're putting plaque in your arteries. It's the plaque that can kill you."
A heart scan-a painless procedure that takes about five minutes and costs $400-can tell your calcium score, which ranges from zero to the low thousands.