Cardiovascular - June 2014 Archives

ROCHESTER, Minn. — Physicians using body mass index (BMI) to diagnose children as obese may be missing 25 percent of kids who have excess body fat despite a normal BMI, which can be a serious concern for long-term health, according to a Mayo Clinic study published online today in Pediatric Obesity. The researchers found that BMI has high specificity in identifying pediatric obesity, meaning BMI accurately identifies children who are obese, but has a moderate sensitivity, meaning the BMI tool misses children who actually should be considered obese, according to the percent of fat in their bodies. “If we are using BMI to find out which children are obese, it works if the BMI is high, but what about the children who have a normal BMI but do have excess fat? Those parents may get a false sense of reassurance that they do not need to focus on a better weight for their children,” says Francisco Lopez-Jimenez, M.D., senior study author and director of preventive cardiology at Mayo Clinic, Rochester, Minn. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SSDGfpxYapA

DEAR MAYO CLINIC: How do I know if what I have is acid reflux or GERD? Are treatments the same for both? I have had what I would describe as heartburn for years and it’s getting worse as I age. ANSWER: Acid reflux happens when stomach acid flows back up into your esophagus — the tube that connects your throat to your stomach. With acid reflux, you may get a taste of food or sour liquid at the back of your mouth, feel chest pain or pressure, or get a burning sensation in your chest. That sensation is called heartburn. When acid reflux leads to frequent symptoms or complications, then it is called gastroesophageal reflux disease or GERD. GERD usually requires treatment. If you have reflux symptoms more than twice a month, see your doctor to have your condition evaluated. Occasional acid reflux is very common. Almost everyone experiences it from time to time. Acid reflux starts to become a problem when it happens frequently, involves large amounts of acid, or affects the part of your esophagus closest to your throat. GERD is a more severe form of acid reflux. The most common symptom of GERD is frequent heartburn. Other signs and symptoms may include regurgitation of food or sour liquid, difficulty swallowing, coughing, wheezing and chest pain — especially while lying down at night.

Every day more than a thousand people in the United States experience sudden cardiac arrest and it kills several hundred thousand people every year. On the next ...

Every day more than a thousand people in the United States experience sudden cardiac arrest and it kills several hundred thousand people every year. On the next Mayo Clinic Radio, Saturday, June 14, at 9 am CT, Roger White, M.D., will join us to discuss what happens to your heart during cardiac arrest. What should you do to help until an ambulance arrives? Where can you learn CPR? How do you use an automatic external defibrillator? We'll find out the answers to these questions and more on the next program. Join us! Myth or Fact:  Perform CPR before you use an AED when you suspect someone is having a cardiac arrest. To hear the program LIVE on Saturday, click here. Follow #MayoClinicRadio and tweet your questions. Mayo Clinic Radio is available on iHeart Radio. Listen to this week’s Medical News Headlines: News Segment 2 June 15, 2014 (right click MP3)  

Method may shed light on how to better gauge heart health in lupus, other inflammatory diseases Rochester, Minn. — Rheumatoid arthritis patients overall are twice as likely as the average person to develop heart problems. Pinpointing which rheumatoid arthritis patients need stepped-up heart disease prevention efforts has been a challenge; research by Mayo Clinic and others has found that standard heart disease risk assessment tools may underrate the danger a particular person faces. To better pinpoint rheumatoid arthritis patients’ heart disease risk, an international team that includes Mayo researchers has created a heart disease risk calculator tailored to rheumatoid arthritis. Details on the new method, known as the Transatlantic Cardiovascular Risk Calculator for Rheumatoid Arthritis, or ATACC-RA, were presented at the European League Against Rheumatism annual meeting June 11-14 in Paris. The research team includes institutions from around the United States, Canada, Mexico, South Africa and Europe; Mayo is gathering and analyzing the group’s data.

ROCHESTER, Minn. — Mayo Clinic Children’s Center has again been ranked as the top performing children’s hospital in Minnesota, Iowa and the Dakotas on U.S. News & World Report’s 2014-2015 Best Children’s Hospitals rankings. Overall rankings for the Mayo Clinic Children’s Center significantly increased in nearly all of the pediatric specialties, including cancer (#13), cardiology and heart surgery (#13), gastroenterology and GI surgery (#17), nephrology (#25), neurology and neurosurgery (#19), pulmonology (#31) and urology (#11). “The Mayo Clinic Children’s Center brings Mayo Clinic quality to children and families not only through cutting-edge interventions such as the launch of the proton beam therapy for childhood cancer in 2015 and stem cell treatment for children with heart disease, but also through the integrated, multispecialty team approach that has served as the cornerstone of the Mayo Clinic approach to patients of all ages for more than 150 years,” says hospital director Randall Flick, M.D., M.P.H.

Miss the show? Here is the podcast: Mayo Clinic Radio Full Show 6-14-2014 44 min mp3 Every day more than a thousand people in the United ...