CVD News Watch for the Weekend, August 1
It’s Friday again and I am bringing you good and not-so-good news from the CVD front.
Archive for the Battling The Monster category
Resource article for July: Alcohol and CVD Part II
The adverse effects of heavy drinking: too much of a good thing can be bad
As promised, I present here the second part of the series of resource posts on alcohol consumption and its effect on cardiovascular health. In the first part, I’ve tackled the health benefits associated with light to moderate alcohol drinking. In this post, I present a review of the adverse effects of alcohol drinking.
School diet program helped children in controlling weight problems
In some parts of the world, children are dying of hunger; in other parts, children are dying from obesity-related health problems. Such irony.
Childhood obesity is becoming a major problem in the developed world. In the US alone, 16.9% of boys and 15.6% of girls aged 6 to 11 years among non-Hispanic whites are overweight. Among non-Hispanic blacks, it’s 17.2% of boys and 24.8%of girls in the same age group. For Mexican Americans, it’s 25.6% of boys and 16.6% of girls. (Source: American Heart Association (AHA)). Obesity is a major risk factor in cardiovascular health as well as type 2 diabetes.
Remembering Tim Russert
Instead of featuring a heart(y) celebrity this month, I would like to pay my respects to Tim Russert of NBC.
I was travelling around Western Europe when I heard of his unexpected death. Even here in the old continent, his name and face was known, especially among the English-speaking community. Russert was a respected political journalist whose opinion carried a lot of weight in the political scene.
Dance your heart back to health
Those rehab exercises can be a bore sometimes. Treadmill, cycles, weights, sit-ups…I’m sure many cardiac patients on rehab get sick of these exercises and are simply tempted to stop. Well, this Mexican doctor may just have found a better alternative…What about dancing?
Dr Paula Quiroga of the National Institute of Cardiology Ignacio Chavez of Mexico City went for dancing steps instead of the usual rehab routine and got better results. More →
Resource Article for June: Heart and Stroke Statistics
Today, let’s have a look at figures and statistics on heart and stroke that we can ponder upon:
According the Centers for Disease Prevention and Control (CDC), heart disease is the number one killer in the US [1]. More →
June’s Heart(y) Celebrity - Toni Braxton: Battling heart disease from within and from without
She is not your typical heart patient: she is young, physically fit, and slim. But musical performer and Grammy-award winner Toni Braxton knows how it feels to battle the monster that is heart disease. And she puts her celebrity status to use for a good cause - to increase awareness about heart disease among women.
Four years ago, Toni experienced symptoms of breathless and tightness in her chest during a performance’s intermission and ended up in an emergency room. She was diagnosed to have pericarditis. According to Medline Medical Encyclopedia, pericarditis is
More →
It’s National CPR/AED Awareness Week
Do you know how to perform a cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and use an an automated external defibrillator (AED)? Do you know how to act in an emergency to help save a life? As part of the National CPR/AED Awareness Week, the American Heart Association (AHA) conducted a survey about the ability of Americans to act appropriately in a cardiac emergency. And the results are a bit disappointing.
The AHA survey was done online and 1,132 responded to the survey, 162 of whom were African Americans and 150 were Hispanics. 89% or the respondents were willing to help in an emergency situation. The rest are not willing or hesitant to help out because of lack of confidence in their life-saving skills, concerns about possible litigation, or fear of doing more harm than good.
How earthquakes can affect your heart and your health
In the wake of last week’s catastrophic earthquake in China, we can only imagine the trauma that the victims and their families went through - trauma that will probably stay with them for the rest of their lives. With such trauma comes psychological stress and with increased stress comes elevated cardiovascular risk.
Several research studies have investigated the effect of acute stressors such as catastrophes and natural disasters on the cardiovascular well-being of the victims and people in the vicinity. A review article by Dr. JE Dimsdale of the University of California at San Diego shows that many of these studies observed an increased cardiovascular risk after earthquakes.
SHARON MOVED TO TEL AVIV
Former Israeli prime minister Ariel Sharon has been transferred from Jerusalem’s Hadassah hospital to a rehabilitation centre in Tel Aviv, five months after suffering a massive brain haemorrhage.
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Raquel Billiones has a PhD in Biology and has over 15 years experience as a researcher, scientific English teacher, and medical writer. Since 2006, she has been a freelance WAHM specializing in medical writing and scientific documentation. 
