Archive | August, 2009

Not just for soldiers anymore: Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder after a heart attack

25 Aug

by Carolyn Thomas

When I was at Mayo Clinic last fall, I watched a short film about women and heart disease. A 40-something woman onscreen told the interviewer that ever since her heart attack had happened, she was afraid to go to sleep every night, because now she wasn’t sure that she would ever wake up.

I began to weep when I heard her say this.

For the previous five months since my own heart attack, I’d been somehow compelled to clean the entire apartment every night before bedtime, “just in case”. I emptied trash, recycled  all newspapers, swept and scrubbed and tidied.  I was unknowingly planning that, if this were the night I was going to have another heart attack, the paramedics and the coroner and (worse) my grown kidlets would find me in a nice clean place.  It suddenly struck me on that day at Mayo Clinic that every night, I had been essentially preparing for my own death. Night after night, month after month. And I was utterly exhausted.

The upside: the place had never been so clean. (more…)

Cardiologist’s plan: “Fat people need not apply for jobs at Cleveland Clinic”

24 Aug

cleveland clinic

For the past two years, the Cleveland Clinic has refused to hire smokers.  This non-profit American research and treatment health centre (consistently rated as the #1 heart institute in North America) introduced this groundbreaking no-smoking hiring initiative as a way to walk the talk about the health and wellness of not only the 50,000 patients admitted each year, but of its 1,800 employees.

But now the head of the Cleveland Clinic says he wants to take this bold hiring policy one step further – and some are saying this would be going too far.  Dr. Delos (Toby) Cosgrove, the heart surgeon who is the Clinic’s CEO, told the New York Times that if it were up to him, he would not only stop hiring smokers. He would also stop hiring obese people. (more…)

Could ‘goodism’ and self-sacrifice be linked to women’s heart disease?

23 Aug

These days, whenever I tell the story of the hours leading up to my hospitalization for a heart attack last year, I ask others to guess what I would have done had those horrific cardiac symptoms been happening to my daughter  (or my next-door neighbour, or even a perfect stranger) during that endless cross-country flight back home to the West Coast. Would I have patted her grim, sweaty face and whispered:

“Just try to hang on, honey. We’ll be home in nine hours…”

No, my Heart Sisters, I would have been screaming bloody murder for the Air Canada crew to get help immediately, even if it meant turning the damn plane around.  But since these attacks were happening to me, and not to somebody else, I chose instead the unwise and potentially fatal option of just slinking down in my seat, very still, hour after hour, and trying not to make a fuss.

Dr. Barbara Keddy of Nova Scotia is a woman who probably understands why I and other women would react in this inexplicable fashion when it comes to getting our own needs met during a crisis. The university professor and author of  Women and Fibromyalgia: Living with an Invisible Dis-ease has suffered from this chronic and debilitating condition herself for over 40 years. During the process of interviewing others with fibromyalgia while she was writing her book, Dr. Keddy experienced a profound ‘aha’ moment that led her to what she now considers a highly likely explanation of why fibromyalgia occurs primarily in women. (more…)

De-junk your kitchen to start heart-smart eating

22 Aug

Here’s a quick way to start eating in a more heart-healthy way literally overnight: do a pantry makeover.  Start by getting rid of every food item in your kitchen that has either of these two characteristics:  too little nutritional value (fibre, vitamins, minerals, protein) or  too much fat, sodium or sugar.  This includes all junk food of course, but also almost all processed foods in your pantry.  When I first got home from hospital after my heart attack, for example, I became an obsessive grocery label reader.  I couldn’t believe the sodium content in a can of refried beans!  That stuff will kill you.

If you put unhealthy food in your grocery cart, you’ll eat it.  If you don’t, you won’t. Very simple. When you go shopping, bring a list.  Don’t shop on an empty stomach. Choose most foods from around the perimeter of the grocery store, where the healthiest food tends to be located. And most important – read those labels.  But meanwhile, if you’re feeling ruthless, start tossing out anything in your pantry right now that fits those two criteria  - and then let’s look at re-stocking basic heart-healthy pantry must-haves:

(more…)

Finally! The truth about what causes women’s heart attacks!

21 Aug

food diet apple

Finally, scientists have definitive numbers proving the clear link between our diet and heart attacks.  It’s a relief to know the truth after all those conflicting nutritional studies.

1. Japanese eat very little fat and suffer fewer heart attacks than North Americans do.

2. Mexicans eat a lot of fat and suffer fewer heart attacks than their North American counterparts.

3. Chinese drink very little red wine and suffer fewer heart attacks than North Americans.

4. Italians drink a lot of red wine and suffer fewer heart attacks than North Americans.

5. Germans drink a lot of beer and eat lots of sausages and fats, and suffer fewer heart attacks than North Americans.

CONCLUSION:

Eat and drink what you like. Speaking English is apparently what kills you.

I laughed out loud when I first heard this, but it also, sadly, reinforces for me the dilemma of interpreting all cardiac research. (more…)

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