Podcast Summary

Welcome to Dr. Warrick's podcast channel. Warrick is a practicing cardiologist and author with a passion for improving care by helping patients understand their heart health through education. Warrick believes educated patients get the best health care. Discover and understand the latest approaches and technology in heart care and how this might apply to you or someone you love. My name is Dr. Warrick Bishop and I'd like to welcome you to my podcast and videocast station. Today I'd like to talk about a terrific document put out by the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute. It's called No Second Chances. And this is about understanding the ongoing risk that people who have had a cardiac event continue to carry. This is a really nicely put together document and outlines some of the major points which are so important for us to take heed of and act on. I'm going to read out some of these main points but the essence of this document is to make us focus on the fact that we can do better if someone's had an event and we have every obligation to try and reduce that person's risk into the future because to not do so leaves them an leaves them at unacceptably high risk of a further event. So some of the main stats that really are shocking, confronting and should focus our attention are these. If you've had a heart attack, you are twice as likely to die prematurely compared to the general population. Think about that for a moment. We know that if you do have a heart attack, there's a one in six chance you'll die anyway. So already you've defined yourself as dying prematurely. So this is talking about the remaining five. Of the five people who survived that heart attack, some of them will have irreversible damage to their heart and it'll impact their lives forever. But that group of five have survived and now... twice as likely to die prematurely compared to their age-matched equivalents. This is really a warning sign, a red light, a flashing light, a hazard sign telling us we need to put effort into those individuals. If you've had two or more heart attacks, you are three times more likely to die prematurely. So this is really saying if you've had one and then another, The odds are really stacked against you. I think this is in keeping with what we'd imagine. There's no surprises there, but it really is telling us we've got to be better or as good as we can at preventing further events for people who've had their first event. Within 12 months, one in 10 heart attack survivors will have another heart attack. That's 10% of people who've had a heart attack having another within 12 months. This is so critical to our focus and attention we bring to the medications to reduce that risk. We know that people do drop off medications, and we know that when you match up the people who drop off medications with those who have events, then the people who have dropped off their medication are so much more higher to have a second event. This is confronting. In just seven days, about 10% of people who have a stroke will have another. Well, this is a scary phenomenon, but we really do need to be aware that what we have to do is not only deal with people when they've had an event, their heart attack or their stroke, but let's step back from that and think, can we be better at preventing that first episode? Can our primary prevention strategies improve as well? People who have had an event and trying to prevent them having a further event, understanding their significant increase in risk. But more than that, I'd like to take a further step and say, can we stop the first episode? I want to encourage people like yourselves listening to this to be aware, to be proactive. To think that you go and service your car while it's still working well. You don't wait for it to break down. I'd like you to think about you going and getting yourself serviced well. Getting checked out. Getting the blood pressure checked. Getting the cholesterol checked. Keeping up the exercise regime. Making sure the fuel you put in the body is right. Blood pressure. Cholesterol. Exercise. Good diet. follow-ups with your general practitioner and understanding risk are all important, proactive, preventative strategies you can do. I'm going to encourage you to do that, of course. But I'm going to wrap up with this fantastic document from the Baker Heart and Diabetes Institute, No Second Chance, which reminds us that heart disease remains the most expensive disease in the country, costing somewhere around $12 billion in 2012 to 2013 and is estimated to be costing somewhere around $22 billion by 2032-33. If I can implore you, if you've been put on medication to modify your risk, if you've had an event, your risk is incredibly high. If you've been put on medication before a risk, please recognise the value that medication may have. There are no second chances for those who die. I hope this message reaches you. I hope it reaches you so that you can reach out to someone you love who may be in that situation. This is such important stuff. The medicines work. We can make a difference. Let's make sure that people live as well as possible. for as long as possible. I do wish you the very best in health. If you do have any queries or questions, please drop us a note. Always interested to hear from you. If you do have any suggestions about future topics for the podcast or videocast, please let us know. As always, I do wish you the best health. Take care of yourself. And until next time, please don't die from a heart attack. Goodbye. You have been listening to another podcast from Dr. Warrick. Visit his website at drWarrickbishop.com for the latest news on heart disease. If you love this podcast, feel free to leave us a review.