a Health Alert to tell you about this
morning there are several medical
conditions that raise a person's chance
of developing premature heart disease a
new study looked at how obesity in
severe obesity play a role in heart
issues especially for children and
teenagers according to the report
children who are overweight are three
times more likely to die from
cardiovascular disease when they reach
adulthood they also run a higher risk of
developing type 2 diabetes joining us in
this morning is st. Vincent's
cardiologist dr. Sam ER Garris thank you
so much for coming in thank you for
having me I used to it
are you surprised when you hear these
numbers no not at all it's actually
something we've all kind of known but
it's great that the American Heart
Association now has put that out so that
way increase awareness and it helped
doctors and patients and kids learn that
this is a serious matter to take it more
seriously and get treated sooner than
later now listening to this statement
overweight children who are overweight
are three times more likely to die from
cardiovascular disease when they reach
adulthood yes can they change that
around if they do lose that weight yes
when they are children
absolutely so that is the whole idea of
that statement from the men getting
those sounds that yes is discussing
these risk factors so that we can
address them sooner than later so if
patients and kids are aware that this is
a serious matter they can work on the
weight they can work on exercise and
improving their lifestyle and as a
result have decreased the risk of
cardiovascular disease and when we talk
about risk factors we are talking about
children with diabetes sure the Nets
that's the whole idea also is patients
that I have or kids that have type 1 or
type 2 diabetes familial
hypercholesterolemia these are all the
entities that we want to address and
treat people before they're older before
they get disease we're really good at at
treating patients when they already have
the disease but we're not doing a good
job preventing the disease of a heart
disease so putting out the statement and
learning that we can prevent it before
it happens is critically important when
we hear statistic that states one in
five children are considered obese
is this an epidemic absolutely and in
the United States is leading the way in
with the childhood obesity lack of
exercise you know video games so it's
clearly an epidemic and we we need to
talk about it like we are today that's
helpful for patients and families to
realize this is a serious matter
daily exercise watching the weight and
especially in kids that start developing
diabetes at early age that becomes a
serious chronic condition that needs to
be dealt with and also high cholesterol
is another factor this whole annotation
we have a great treatment so high
cholesterol we can treat we can treat
diabetes but again more importantly we
would like to catch before it happens
heart attacks at early age can happen
absolutely when people say oh I'm only
thirty I'm only 42 we do see patients
that come with massive heart attacks at
age 30 or 40 and people can die from
them this is a serious matter and be
able to treat people early is the best
thing we can do for everybody
30% of all victims who have heart
attacks are between the ages of 35 and
54 yes number
yeah and that people always think that
the heart disease is the age of the very
elderly they're 70 or 80 but it happens
in 30 year olds 40 year olds and the
awareness of it and help preventing it
is very very important we've identified
some signs of premature heart disease
what are some others well the patients
that have family history of heart
disease should be very aware and very
careful the patients that develop early
hypertension early diabetes patients
with have very high cholesterol these
are all risk factors that put you at a
very very high incidence of heart
disease so if you have a family history
of a heart attack you need to be
addressed early your cholesterol needs
to be very low your weight needs to be
down and your diabetes need to be
treated so family history all these risk
factors need to be addressed sooner than
later
being a cardiologist from your
perspective how do you have this
conversation with parents or with
children themselves about being
healthier eating healthy getting mobile
yeah that's the great question and it
really should happen before they come to
me before they start seeing a heart
doctor this is the conversation that
needs to be had by the primary care
doctor
awareness and you say listen you know if
you take care of yourself now you're not
going to be having a stroke and a heart
attack at age 60 and a nursing home so
it's important to take care of yourself
now or if you're at home watching this
yeah that conversation now yes start
your exercise today dr. Guerra thank you
so much for coming thank you thank you