Advice to A Patient

Podcast Transcript

Announcer:

Welcome to Love Your Heart, brought to you by Cleveland Clinic's Sydell and Arnold Miller Family Heart, Vascular and Thoracic Institute. These podcasts will help you learn more about your heart, thoracic and vascular systems, ways to stay healthy and information about diseases and treatment options. Enjoy!

Dennis Bruemmer, MD, PhD:

Hello, good afternoon. My name is Dennis Bruemmer. I'm a staff cardiologist in the Department of Cardiology in the Heart, Vascular and Thoracic Institute at Cleveland Clinic. I think just setting an initial goal to be more active is quite appropriate. I think the nutrition and the activity are important, but also, it's very important to be screened for the cardiovascular risk factors, which are so common out there. I think the first, as I said, the most important step is the first step.

Leslie Cho, MD:

My name is Leslie Cho. I'm the director of Women's Cardiovascular Center at Cleveland Clinic. Well, I think my biggest piece is that number one, heart disease is preventable. So, the best way to never see the inside of a cardiac cath lab or the surgical suite is to prevent heart disease. If there is one message, whether you're a man or a woman, that I want to stress, it is that you need to be mindful. You need to know your numbers, your cholesterol, your glucose numbers, your blood pressure numbers, your ideal body weight. You need to know all of these things. Really important to have that as part of your annual physical checkup.

Oussama Wazni, MD:

I'm Oussama Wazni. I'm the section head of Clinical Electrophysiology here at the Cleveland Clinic. I think very important is a healthy diet, maintaining a healthy weight, decrease the risk of sleep apnea. And if somebody is having palpitations or they're not feeling well and they feel that they're out of sorts, they should be checked for atrial fibrillation because depending on risk factors, that could put them at risk for having a stroke.

Jacqueline Tamis-Holland, MD:

Hi, I'm Jacqueline Tamis-Holland. I'm an interventional cardiologist and I'm institute director for Acute Coronary Care at Cleveland Clinic. Key points to remember. If you're having some sort of chest discomfort, and it doesn't have to be pain, if you're having severe shortness of breath or terrible sweats or nausea or vomiting, this could be a sign of a heart attack and you want to call 911 and get to the hospital quickly because time is muscle.

Marc Gillinov, MD:

I'm Marc Gillinov, chair of Thoracic and Cardiovascular Surgery at Cleveland Clinic. If you are a candidate for surgery, the next question is who should do it? So you need to find somebody with expertise, have surgical teams that have a lot of experience with great results, and it's certainly worth your while to determine whether or not you're a candidate for surgery, and then to decide where should I go for my surgery, based on the experience, the expertise, and the results of the surgeons that you are considering.

Eileen Hsich, MD:

I'm Dr. Eileen Hsich, and I'm the medical director for Heart Transplant Cleveland Clinic. Such important questions. It's have hope! Your team is rooting for you. Everyone's rooting for you, and I think at times patients wonder, is this really going to happen? Because nobody has that crystal ball, and I think you need to know that we have a lot of ways to help you get to that point. So don't ever give up faith and hope and our goal is to get you there.

Announcer:

Thank you for listening. We hope you enjoyed the podcast. We welcome your comments and feedback. Please contact us at heart@ccf.org. Like what you heard? Subscribe wherever you get your podcasts or listen at clevelandclinic.org/loveyourheartpodcast.