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 “We have known for a long time that the overwhelming majority of
heart disease is preventable if you treat blood pressure and you
treat high cholesterol and you treat diabetes,” said Dr. Steve
Nissen, chairman of cardiovascular medicine at the Cleveland Clinic
in Ohio.
“But it’s still the leading cause of death,” Nissen said in a phone
interview. “Complacency is the enemy here.”
For the study, published on the Cleveland Clinic's website,
researchers surveyed a nationally representative sample of 1,002
adults by phone in September 2016. They found that a majority of
participants did know some key risk factors for heart disease.
For example, 77 percent understand that blood pressure matters and
67 percent know weight is important.
Slightly more than half of participants also correctly identified
“bad” LDL cholesterol and body mass index (BMI), a measurement of
weight relative to height, as risk factors.
But the devil is in the details people don’t know.
Just four in ten people knew a healthy blood pressure reading was
less than 120/80.
Even though heart rate isn’t an important risk factor for
calculating the risk of heart disease, 59 percent of participants
incorrectly identified this as a factor that influences risk.
When it comes to weight, 70 percent of people knew their own weight
off the top of their head. However, only 30 percent of them knew
their waist circumference and just 18 percent knew their BMI.
Even when people knew a healthy BMI is one way to lower the risk of
heart disease, just 23 percent of participants understood that a
person is considered overweight with a BMI of 25 or more.
And with waist circumference, only 34 percent of participants knew
that carrying fat around the stomach area, sometimes known as an
“apple shape” body, is the most dangerous for heart health.
People were also confused about how cholesterol levels influence the
risk of heart disease. Only 12 percent of them knew screening for
cholesterol should start in early adulthood, and most people
incorrectly identified triglycerides as cholesterol when they are a
type of fat in the blood.
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Most participants also didn’t grasp the connection between diabetes
and heart disease; 73 percent of respondents didn’t know heart
disease is the leading cause of death for people with diabetes.
While some people might not know these numbers because they’re young
and healthy, others who do have some risk factors for heart disease
may have been told and forgotten the details, said Dr. Deepak Bhatt,
executive director of interventional cardiovascular programs at
Brigham and Women’s Hospital Heart and Vascular Center in Boston.
“It is probably more important for someone with abnormal
measurements to be aware of the cutoffs for normal versus abnormal
than for someone whose numbers are all good,” Bhatt, who wasn’t
involved in the survey, said by email.
Still, every person should know how these numbers change over time,
and look for early warning signs of measurements creeping closer to
unhealthy levels, Bhatt said. There are many smartphone apps that
can help track this, or a simple notebook works just fine.
That’s because when certain numbers start moving in a direction that
could become a problem in the future, there are often still things
patients can do to prevent health issues from developing.
“Doctors may not prescribe a pill when certain numbers like weight
or blood pressure creep up but remain in a healthy range, but they
might recommend lifestyle changes,” Nissen said. “For example, we
may ask you to change your diet or get more exercise.”
SOURCE: http://cle.clinic/2k8ozsy Cleveland Clinic Heart Health
Survey, online February 1, 2017.
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