Research shows that there are an estimated 45
million patients of coronary artery disease in India. It has been
further found out that Coronary Artery disease has increased by leaps and bounds in women. The
established standard notion that women are protected from Heart disease and
that they require higher risk factors for disease development no more holds relevance.
According to
statistics, the mortality rate among women suffering from cardiovascular
diseases is also higher than that of men across the world, including India. The
main reason behind the increased mortality rate in women is the changes in
lifestyle in metropolitan cities. In big cities, women have extra pressure of
earning money along with taking care of home. Long working hours and taking help
of smoking and drinking to deal with the stress of personal and professional
life has become the main reason behind the heart ailments.
One of the most
disturbing facts was that arteries of Indian women are narrower as compared to
men hence they are more vulnerable to coronary diseases.
According to the data
collected during a study conducted by the New England Journal of Medicine in
India in May 2008, out of 33,000 deceased women, those who had smoked, died or
suffered from heart or lung-related respiratory, vascular or neo-plastic
diseases. The study also showed that the trend of smoking among women between
30 and 69 years in India rose steadily from three percent to six percent over
the decades. Previous studies have associated smoking with reduction in median
survival of eight years for women, compared to six years for men in the
country.
The major causes of coronary diseases among
Indian women are diabetes, high cholesterol level or dyslipidemia, smoking, bad
metabolism and premature menopause or estrogen deficiency.
It has been proved
that diabetes takes away the so-called ‘female advantage’, or the natural
protection present in women of child bearing age. High blood pressure affects
men and women equally. Data collected during the Inter Heart study proved that
abdominal obesity, increased waist-hip ratio and high levels of cholesterol are
more common in women with heart disease.
In cases of two or more arteries being blocked,
heart bypass surgery is the best option. In heart bypass surgery, a new piece
of blood vessel is sewed to bridge over (bypass) the blockage. In today’s age,
many new innovations are taking place in the medical world and one such
innovation is “Minimal access surgery or key-hole surgery” or “The Nambiar
technique”. In this technique, bypass operation is done with just 2-3 inch cut
on the left side of the chest where as conventional bypass surgery is done
through cutting the middle bone of the chest.
Also, no other cut is made in the body for taking graft (veins/arteries
for grafting) unlike conventional technique, in which doctors take veins from
both the legs and arteries from arms for most of the cases of multiple grafts.
The arteries used are called internal mammary arteries which are inside the
chest and last 25-30 years unlike leg veins which last only 10-12 years
The advantage of this technique is that the patient
recovery is very fast and he can get back to his normal work in almost 10 days
time after operation also there is very less chances of infection.
With this type of operation, patient can go home on
3rd or 4th day of the operation if all his parameters are
fine.
Studies have shown that the vein grafts taken from
the legs usually remains open for 10-12 years where as arterial grafts remain
open for more then 25-30 years, thereby the patient does not require any other
intervention ever.
As they say,
prevention is better than cure. There are many ways to stay fit and avoid any
kind of heart ailments. Most important among them is physical and mental
fitness, which can be easily achieved with 30 minutes of brisk walking daily
along with at least 15 minutes yoga and meditation each. Food has enormous
effect on one’s body. Good dietary habits and control of Diabetes goes a long
way in preventing heart disease. One should avoid Junk Food as it is high on
salt and saturated fats. Use of olive oil, fruits, nuts, leafy vegetables also
helps in controlling diseases and heart diseases. Tough, in this fast time,
anybody hardly has any time to walk,
yoga or meditation but we should always remember that “Health is wealth”.
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