Castle Medical to start
heart program
Castle Medical Center has been recognized by the American Heart Association as a "Get With the Guidelines -- Coronary Artery Disease" hospital.
The program provides standards and procedures for staff to follow to reduce risk of reoccurring heart attacks by coronary patients.
Patients are started in the hospital on aggressive risk-reduction therapies, such as cholesterol-lowering drugs, aspirin, ACE inhibitors and beta-blockers. Before discharge, they also receive counseling to stop smoking and manage weight, and referrals for cardiac rehabilitation.
These standards of care are outlined in the American Heart Association/American College of Cardiology secondary prevention guidelines for coronary patients.
"The full implementation of secondary prevention guidelines is a critical step in saving the lives of coronary patients," said Dr. Lyn Smaha, American Heart Association volunteer chair for the national Get With the Guidelines project.
More than 450,000 people suffer repeat heart attacks each year, according to the heart association. About 22 percent of men and 46 percent of women are disabled with heart failure within six years after a heart attack, the association said. Within one year of an attack, 22 percent of men and 38 percent of women will die, the statistics show.
Robert Walker, Castle Medical Center president, said the center "is dedicated to making our cardiac unit among the best in the country, and implementing the Get With the Guidelines program will help us accomplish this by making it easier for our professionals to improve the long-term outcome for our cardiac patients."
