There is the conviction that if you observe a nutritious diet, exercise and don’t smoke, in other words you’re healthy, you won’t have a heart attack or stroke. Yet heart disease and stroke remain the number one cause of death in the industrial world outpacing respiratory disease, diabetes and cancer by a huge margin. Absent our far from pristine lifestyles, silent, unacknowledged killers like lipoprotein(a) and homocysteine, acting like cholesterol to clog up are arteries, can be equally deadly and won’t be recognized unless they are measured and managed appropriately.
The Sydney Morning Herald recently reported the incidence of two young men, both fit, who succumbed to a heart attack and stroke respectively, the latter leading to temporary blindness. In each case elevated lipoprotein (a) was the primary cause. This tragic course of events could have been prevented had lipoprotein (a) been assessed and corrected. Identifying and targeting lipoprotein (a) and homocysteine before they cause irreversible harm are intrinsic components of the wellness assessment routinely implemented at my clinic.
Corralling these villains might be one way to improve our dismal heart disease statistics.
