Heart Disease UK

Thanks to the dreadful nature of many diagnostic tests, we are often fearful of undergoing such invasive procedures. Who can be blamed for letting “colonoscopy” slip to the bottom of the to-do list?
Fortunately, scientists have been devising a whole new generation of tests that don’t make you sick just thinking about them.
As simple as a finger prick for blood or the click of a camera, these painless procedures can help catch diseases before they begin to wreak havoc. Here are three tests, available now, plus a preview of some others just around the corner.

Coronary heart disease is the number one killer in this country. Every four minutes is slays another victim. Geoffrey Lunt, 31, had no inkling that he could be next when he walked into the Wellington Hospital in North London. An investment banker, Lunt had slightly raised blood pressure and was fully aware that his father had died of a heart attack. A treadmill test (the baseline test to identify heart disease) had put him in the clear. However, based on his family background, Lunt’s GP referred him for a new electron beam computed tomography (EBCT) scan - the Lamborghini of scanners. Installed this year at the Wellington’s Cardiac Imaging & Research Centre the EBCT has already benefited 1,000 patients, with the capacity to scan 5,000 a year.
EBCT is like a regular CT scan, but much faster, explains consultant cardiologist Dr. Avijit Lahiri . “In both tests, the patient lies on a table surround by an X-ray tube. With EBCT, electron beams move from side to side, creating 40 to 50 cross-sectional images of the heart. You just hold your breath a couple of times and it’s over.”
Conventional CT scanners have shutter speeds of about three-quar¬ters of a second, during which the heart contracts and relaxes, so if you take a picture, it will be blurred. But with the EBCT’s 100-millisecond scan times, motion is minimised. The cameras work so fast they capture still pictures right round the heart.
The resulting images indicate how much calcium has formed in the coronary arteries. Calcium forms on the build-up of cholesterol on artery walls and eventually causes hardening of the arteries. The higher the calcium score , the greater the likelihood of coronary attack.
Lunts results were shocking. Doctors classify a calcium score above 400 as severe; Lunt’s was 1,180. One of his coronary arteries was almost totally blocked. Angiogram confirmed the findings. “He was heading straight for a heart attack,” says Lahiri.
Lunt was put on medication to lower his cholesterol and blood pressure. He also underwent angioplasty – a metal coil was inserted into the artery to brace it open. As Lunt says, “without this test I wouldn’t be here today.”
Some 500 hospital patients are being offered EBCT on the NHS as part of a study, but most people must go privately – the main health insurance companies cover the £400 cost. Contact the Welling¬ton’s Cardiac Imaging and Research Centre at info@heart0scan.co.uk

Reprinted with permission from
Reader’s Digest, December 2002