What is Preventive Cardiology?
It is taking early action to prevent an event from taking place. Therefore when we talk about Preventive Pediatric Cardiology we first pretend to identify if there are risks of developing cardiac illness and after that take the actions to prevent them.
Cardiovascular diseases (heart attacks, hypertension, strokes or brain hemorrhages), today are the number ONE cause of death in the adult population. These diseases start taking shape at infancy and they are appearing at increasingly earlier ages (in young adults). Cardiovascular diseases associate themselves with chronic-degenerative health problems such as diabetes.
It is important for the pediatrician and/or cardiologist to develop a good medical record to determine the risk factors that the child presents to allow for early intervention and prevent cardiovascular diseases that may start at adolescence.
The risk factors are
* Obesity or overweight
* Sedentary child (non-active)
* Diabetes
The following family backgrounds are also risk factors:
* Diabetes
* Hypertension
* Hyperlipidemia (blood with high fat content)
* Metabolic Syndrome
* Sudden death
* Heart attack in a close relative under 60
* Cerebrovascular diseases (strokes, etc.)
