Preventing a Heart Attack

It is no accident that heart attack has been referred to as a "thief in the night," alluding to the biblical character that Jesus mention in the gospels. And one of our friends and readers, wants to know how to prevent it from happening.

LAST Jan. 5, a regular reader of Breakthroughs through Sun-Star Network Exchange sent me an email:

Dear Sirs,

Having read your column, I'm interested in knowing more as I have a history of heart disease. And also how can I prevent heart attack?

Awaiting your reply, Peter Parr, O.B.E.

His letter led me to delve deeper into the challenges that heart attack prevention demands. And admittedly prevention is far better than cure.

Heart attack (stroke) is a physical incident wherein the blood supply to a part of the heart gets interrupted, causing the heart cells to die. This incident results from the rupture of a plaque, an unstable collection of dense fats and white cells stuck in the wall of a heart artery. Its fragments restrict the blood supply to the heart cells, depleting the availability of oxygen, and damaging or killing the affected group of cells.

Research literature to-date indicates that preventing stroke essentially involves... [READ MORE]

This article appears in SunStar Cebu newspaper on 13 March 2012.

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