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We Have Your Best Interests at Heart
These tips for a healthier heart are brought to you courtesy of the physicians associated with the new open heart program at Northwest Hospital.
The most important thing you can do for your heart," Fredric Tobis, MD, Northwest Hospital cardiologist, said, "is to know your own risk factors, including your family health history, and take steps to reduce risk wherever you can." |
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Eat Heart-y
You don't have to live on rice cakes to keep your heart healthy. You just have to be heart-smart about what you eat. Your body itself makes about two thirds of your cholesterol, so you can only reduce it by about a third with diet alone. But, you can have an impact on which kind of cholesterol your body makes.
Good Guys vs. Bad Guys These cholesterols aren't in food, but what you eat affects your body's production of them. Eating low-fat foods, especially combined with a regular exercise program and losing weight, encourages the body to make HDL. Try these fat reducing substitutes in your next recipe:
1 cup skim milk for 1 cup whole milk--saves 8 grams of fat and 64 calories 1 cup evaporated skim milk for 1 cup cream --saves 60 grams of fat and 392 calories 1 cup nonfat sour cream for 1 cup sour cream--saves 39 grams of fat and 256 calories 2 egg whites for 1 whole egg--saves 6 grams of fat and 47 calories |
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Physicians actively associated with the combined cardiology and cardiac surgery programs at Northwest:
Fredric Tobis, MD,
Edward Verrier, MD,
Nathaniel Arcega, MD,
Richard Anderson, MD,
Scott Burks, MD,
Joseph Chambers, MD,
Victor Chan, MD,
R. Raschal Cochran, MD,
William Curtis, MD,
Daniel Fishbein, MD,
George Frank, MD,
Margaret Hall, MD,
Bradley Hofer, MD,
Hsiaoyu Jiang, MD,
Peter Kudenchuk, MD,
Howard Lewis, MD,
Joseph Lu, MD,
Robert Mito, MD,
James Ritchie, MD,
Bruce Spiess, MD,
Douglas Stewart, MD,
David Warth, MD,
Gary Weeks, MD,
Daniel Wilkinson, MD,
Marko Yakovlevitch, MD,
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The Northwest Hospital Foundation supports the hospital's not-for-profit community health programs and services such as cardiac rehabilitation, Hospice Northwest and neurosciences.
For more information, |
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If You Suspect a Heart Attack, Call 911!
When a heart attack strikes, the patient who gets to the hospital promptly has the best chance of survival . . . whether the attack occurs in a rural area or on the steps of a major heart center. Symptoms vary in nature and intensity, but usually involve a tight, squeezing pain or pressure in the center of the chest lasting for more than a few minutes. Some say it's like an elephant walking on your chest, but others feel only a dull aching sensation. Often the pain radiates to the shoulders, arm, neck or jaw and may be accompanied by sweating, nausea, vomiting, shortness of breath, light-headedness or fainting. These are signs that require immediate medical attention. Known medically as a myocardial infarction, a heart attack typically means that a blood clot or a plaque-laden deposit is preventing blood flow to the heart itself. Without blood and oxygen, the heart muscle doesn't die immediately, but suffers increasing damage as long as the blockage continues. In some cases, the heart also goes into an abnormal rhythm, such as a very slow heart rate (heart block) or a chaotic rhythm (ventricular fibrillation), that makes it difficult to get blood pumped efficiently to other parts of the body, including the brain. That's one reason it's so important to treat a heart attack immediately — the longer the heart goes without blood, the more tissue will be damaged. Yet many people ignore the signs of heart attack because they can mimic gas, heartburn, and indigestion, Fredric Tobis, MD, says. "If there's any feeling of constriction," he warns, "especially if it's accompanied by nausea, vomiting, sweating, or arm or jaw pain, there should be no question — call 911. Don't wait." |
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Comments and suggestions from readers are encouraged. Write to Med-Info Newsletter, public relations department, Northwest Hospital, 1550 N. 115th Street, Seattle, WA 98133 or call 368-1739 during office hours. Valorie J. Fanger, Editor Hospital operator: 206-364-0500 Education and Training: 206-368-1621 Northwest Hospital is an Equal Opportunity Employer and does not discriminate against individuals because of race, color, religion, creed, age, sex, sexual orientation, handicap, marital status, political ideology, ancestry or national origin. © Copyright, 1998 Northwest Hospital. All rights reserved. |
Northwest Hospital Combines Expertise with University of Washington Physicians
"As a not-for-profit hospital, one of our goals continues to be meeting the changing health care needs of the greater Seattle area," said James Hart, Northwest Hospital President. "The new open heart program with University of Washington Physicians will allow us to expand our already first-rate heart program to include open heart services."
The new program will provide patients with a full range of cardiac services from routine diagnosis to sophisticated interventional cardiology procedures and open heart surgery. It will be supervised by Fredric Tobis, MD, a Northwest Hospital cardiologist, and Edward Verrier, MD, chief of the UW's division of cardiac surgery. "Most surgeries will occur at Northwest Hospital," said Dr. Verrier, "with a few very complicated procedures being performed at University of Washington Medical Center."
Comprehensive Heart Care
"Northwest Hospital has been a leader in heart care for quite some time. We have one of the largest groups of cardiologists in the Pacific Northwest," said Mr. Hart. "In addition, we are proud to have employees who are national leaders in the Mended Hearts support group and in the American Heart Association."
"The goal of the collaboration is to link the treatment expertise of the two organizations and make that combined expertise more accessible," said Fredric Tobis, MD. "The bottom line is that the patient will benefit enormously."
"University of Washington Medical Center is pleased to have entered into an agreement with Northwest Hospital for the joint development of programs to benefit the community," said Robert Muilenburg, University of Washington Medical Center Executive Director. "The development of cardiac surgery services at Northwest is an important first step in this shared commitment to expand our training capability and provide increased access to the clinical expertise we have to offer."
Mr. Hart added, "I believe the new Northwest Hospital and University of Washington Physicians open heart program will be one of the best heart programs in the state."
For more information about the heart programs at Northwest Hospital, call the MED-INFO nurses at 1-800-633-4636.
Electricians and Plumbers in Heart Care
One cardiologist jokingly referred to his specialty as being like an electrician or a plumber. Here's why. Most individuals with heart disease have arterial blockages that slow blood flow to the heart. If a coronary artery becomes completely clogged, the result is a heart attack. The solution is similar to what plumbers do when a drain becomes clogged: clear the blockage (balloon angioplasty) or install new lines (bypass surgery). Some heart problems, on the other hand, originate in the heart muscle itself and have to do with the electrical signals that regulate heart rhythm and function. These require an electrical specialist. The regular beating of the heart is controlled by a series of electrical impulses that originate in the sinus node, the natural pacemaker located in the top right hand corner of the heart. From there the signal flows through the two top chambers and is carried down to the ventricles by the AV node where it triggers powerful, regular contractions. If there's a glitch at any point of the electrical system, abnormal rhythms (arrhythmias) can develop. Arrhythmias can produce a heart rate that is either too slow (bradycardia) or too fast (tachycardia). Or they may cause erratic, chaotic heartbeats. In the past, electrocardiology was used primarily for diagnosis. Today, advances in the field have given cardiologists new options for treating patients with rhythm problems. Possibilities include medications, pacemakers, implantable defibrillators and a relatively new technique known as radiofrequency ablation. Pacing the Heart Electrical cardioversion, used to correct an irregular rhythm, is a relatively simple procedure performed under a short-acting anesthetic. An electrical stimulus is used to temporarily stop the irregular electrical activity and, when successful, allows the heart to return to its normal rhythm. Implantable pacemakers were first used to treat rhythm problems in patients in the late 1950s. Today, more than one million Americans depend on a pacemaker to maintain a regular heart rhythm. Techniques of cardiac pacing have advanced rapidly, and patients now benefit from pacemakers that can be programmed externally and that can adapt to the varying physical demands of mildly strenuous exercise. Less common than pacemakers are automatic implantable cardiac defibrillators. External defibrillators are used to restore heart rhythm after a heart attack. For patients at risk of heart fibrillation, a potentially life-threatening emergency, an implantable defibrillator is always ready to restore heart function. Radiofrequency Ablation The cardiologist is able to go into the heart via a catheter, find the extra connection and stop it. Almost like cutting a wire, the unwanted electrical circuit is interrupted and the patient cured.
Medications can be used to treat many heart rhythm problems, but are not effective in all patients. When drugs fail, cardiologists have other options, depending on the problem.
A major innovation in the treatment of arrhythmias is the recent development of radiofrequency ablation, a technique that allows cardiologists to interrupt and destroy the site of origin of a short circuit.
Northwest Hospital's Specialized Heart Programs
At Northwest, we've developed a first rate program for all your heart-care needs.
How Does a Healthy Heart Work?
"The heart is a marvelous and amazingly hard-working organ of the body," said Dr. Tobis. "In an average 70 year lifetime, the heart beats approximately 2.5 billion times. And the circulatory system, through which it pumps blood, is huge. In one body alone, if it were laid end to end, it would encircle the world twice." The Heart Is a Pump The heart has valves located between these chambers and also between the ventricles and the pulmonary artery and the aorta to ensure the blood moves in the right direction. Each day the heart beats 100,000 times, sending oxygen and nutrients to all parts of the body and picking up waste from the body's cells. The heart beat is controlled by electrical pulses, ensuring the chambers contract in the proper order. The cycle begins as blood low in oxygen flows into the right atrium, then through the tricuspid valve into the right ventricle. Then, the right ventricle sends the blood through the pulmonary artery to the lungs where the blood is re-oxygenated. Next, the blood returns to the heart's left atrium, goes through the mitral valve and into the left ventricle. From here blood is pumped to the rest of the body through the aorta, and then returns to the right atrium to start the cycle again.
The heart is a muscle approximately the size of a fist and is composed of four chambers: right and left atria and right and left ventricles.
Simple Explanations for Heart Diseases
Following are explanations of the most common heart diseases and conditions. An aneurysm is a ballooning-out of the wall of a vein, an artery or the heart due to weakening of the wall by disease, injury or birth defect. Angina pectoris is the medical term for chest pain due to coronary heart disease. This is a condition in which the heart muscle doesn't receive enough blood, resulting in chest pain. Aortic regurgitation happens when the aortic valve (between the left ventricle and the aorta) does not close properly and the blood leaks backward through it. The left ventricle has to then pump more blood than normal, and will gradually increase in size because of the extra workload. Arrhythmias or dysrhythmias are abnormal rhythms of the heart. Arrhythmias cause the heart to pump less effectively. Artherosclerosis is a type of arteriosclerosis. It comes from the Greek words athero, meaning paste and sclerosis (hardness). It involves deposits of fatty substances, cholesterol, cellular waste products, calcium and fibrin (a clotting material in the blood) in the inner lining of an artery. The build up that results is called plaque. Arteriosclerosis is a general term for the thickening and hardening of arteries. Atrial fibrillation is a disorder in which the two small upper chambers of the heart quiver instead of beating effectively. A bundle branch block is a condition in which there is a block in the electrical impulses causing one of the ventricles to contract at a different time than the other. Cardiomyopathy is a disease in which the heart muscle becomes damaged and does not work as well as it should. Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary (or lung) Disease (COPD) is caused by emphysema or chronic bronchitis. It can cause high blood pressure in the lungs, leading to heart disease. A congenital heart disease is a disease that was existing at birth. Congestive heart failure is a condition in which the heart can't pump enough blood to meet the needs of the body's other organs. Diastolic dysfunction is when the relaxation part of the cycle is abnormal. An enlarged heart is an increase in the size of the heart that may occur as a result of the thickening of the heart muscle or increased size in the heart chamber in response to increased workload. A heart murmur can be caused by a defective heart valve or hole in the heart walls. Peripheral vascular disease refers to the disease of any of the blood vessels outside of the heart and to diseases of the lymph vessels. Rheumatic heart disease is caused when the heart valves are damaged by rheumatic fever. Ventricular fibrillation is a life-threatening condition in which disordered electrical activity causes the ventricles to contract in a rapid uncoordinated way. Source: American Heart Association.
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