Ann Clin Diabetes Endocrinol | Volume 1, Issue 1 | Review Article | Open Access
Gundu HR Rao*
Department of Laboratory Medicine and Pathology, University of Minnesota, USA
*Correspondance to: Gundu HR Rao
Fulltext PDFHeart disease is the number one killer for both males and females. It kills a lot more people than all forms of cancers put together. In fact, it kills more people than all wars or accidents. Cardiovascular Diseases (CVDs) and ischemic heart disease cause more than 40% of all deaths, according to the World Health Organization. These diseases and associated risks, such as hypertension, excess weight, metabolic syndrome, and type-2 diabetes, are called “silent Killers”, as they are not diagnosed till some major symptoms appear, in other words, they are asymptomatic. Because they are asymptomatic, they go unnoticed for long periods of time, and induce subclinical injuries. In 2013, 17.3 million people were killed by CVDs, including heart attacks, stroke, heart failure, blood pressure, and diseases of the arteries. More than one in three adults (92 million), had some form of heart disease in 2014, accounted for one in three deaths, more than all types of cancer and respiratory diseases. Every 40 seconds, someone in the USA dies from CVDs and someone has a stroke. Despite more than seventy years of research by Framingham Heart Study (FHS) group, National Heart, Blood, and Lung Institutes (NHLBI) of National Institutes of Health (NIH), USA, and spending more than 316 billion dollars per year, this public health problem has stubbornly held on to the top ranking number one position, worldwide for over 100 years. By 2030, the number of casualties is expected to increase 36% to 23.6 million per year. In this overview, we will discuss some of the expectations, limitations of the past approaches, and present our view points on possible novel future approaches.
Gundu HR Rao. Number One Killer: Vascular Disease. Ann Clin Diabetes Endocrinol. 2018; 1(1): 1008.