People above 40 vulnerable to heart diseases: Interventional cardiologist

Patiala, May 5

Medanta Hospital interventional cardiologist Dr Rajneesh Kapoor has advised young men and women to be more careful with heart diseases, especially after the age of 40. He said almost everyone is vulnerable to life-threatening heart diseases beyond the age of 40.

Kapoor, the vice-chairman of the Interventional Cardiology at the hospital, said, “We are noticing incidence of heart disease in people we previously thought were at the lowest risk. Someone assuming that he or she cannot suffer from a heart disease is wrong. From the latest perspective, almost everyone beyond 40 is vulnerable to heart diseases.”

Kapoor said, “It is equally noteworthy that more than 95% of deaths from heart diseases are preventable. After a heart attack, there is a direct relationship between the time of treatment and the survival rate. The mortality or death risk is seen to be five times higher if the treatment is delayed.”

Speaking about newer modalities in heart treatments, he said, “Interventional cardiology advancements have significantly improved the survival rates even in the most complex cardiac cases. For instance, we have performed hundreds of heart valve replacements without surgery through a procedure called transcatheter aortic valve replacement (popularly known as TAVR) and have helped the aged patients and those with high-risk heart valve diseases live a long and good quality life.

Kapoor is a recipient of the Punjab Rattan award.

His associate, cardiology specialist Dr Ashish Kumar Garg, said, “Every year heart disease causes 17 million deaths worldwide. Coronary artery disease has a prevalence rate of up to 13%, which is the highest.”