Each year when we launch into our Cardiac Imaging issue, it makes me conscious of things of the heart. I get guilt trips about those delicious egg sandwiches (with cheese!) I eat at my son’s early Sunday morning hockey games. And thus, I vow to eat healthier, exercise more and get my cholesterol and blood pressure checked regularly.

The statistics I seek to gather don’t help either. It’s no secret that cardiovascular disease (CVD) is America’s leading cause of death, claiming 959,000 Americans each year, based on 1999 American Heart Association data. Of those who die, 53.5 percent are female and 46.5 percent are male. Each day, more than 2,600 Americans die of CVD, or an average of 1 death every 33 seconds. In all, CVD claims as many lives annually as the next seven leading causes of death combined.

The prevalence of CVD is just as daunting, with 61.8 million or 23 percent of Americans living with one or more types of cardiovascular disease. The cost to healthcare is high too, with CVD and stroke costing $329.2 billion each year, including healthcare expenditures and lost productivity from morbidity and mortality.

Based on the reality of the numbers, we should all be afraid of heart disease — and ward it off like an invading army. There’s a lot we can do. Try to eat right by adapting to a diet low in saturated fats (less than 30 percent of total intake), cholesterol (less than 300 mg per day) and sodium, and high in vegetables, fruits, whole grains, legumes, fat-free or low-fat dairy foods and dietary fiber; get your weight in check (40 percent of Americans are overweight); exercise at least three times a week (the weather is getting warmer!); quit smoking (according to the World Health Organization, one year after quitting, the risk of coronary heart disease drops 50 percent); get your blood pressure checked; and have your cholesterol checked (some 102 million Americans have “high” cholesterol over 200 mg/dL, including more women than men; but the benefit in a 10 percent decrease in total cholesterol levels may result in a 30 percent reduction in the incidence of CHD).

If you’re ready, latch on to a good cardiologist. Ask around and get to know someone who will know your history before something goes wrong. We’re on the verge of a shortage of cardiologists (750 new cardiology fellows finished their training last year vs. 1,100 in 1995) as Baby Boomers begin to reach their heavy healthcare use years and true to pattern, seek out cardiac care a decade earlier (in the low to mid 50s) than their parents. And we can’t forget that almost 13 percent of the U.S. population are over 65, the age of greater cardiac risk. Similarly, the number of cardiac imaging procedures is increasing as well, both diagnostic and therapeutic.

In the medical imaging realm, evolving technology is taking the diagnosis and treatment of heart disease up a notch. Echocardiography, cardiac MR, cardiac CT, nuclear medicine and EBT are more effectively diagnosing disease every day. Check out their collaboration in “Views of the Heart: Cross-Modality Imaging” on Page CI-34.

The increasing value of cardiac MRI is detailed, too, in “At the Heart of Cardiac MRI,” beginning on page CI-38. Columnist Doug Orr (on page 92) also reports on the state of cardiac MRI from the recent Society of Cardiovascular Magnetic Resonance meeting in Orlando.

And if you’re in the market for new things cardiac, read our American College of Cardiology show preview (on page CI-44) on new products debuting at the meeting this month in Atlanta. And if you’re at the show, be sure to stand in line for a free cholesterol screening — and bring the results home to your doctor. If you’re not proud enough to show them off, make an effort to change them for the better.

Mary C. Tierney, Editor
mtierney@mwc.com