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March 3, 2006
Heart attack due to heart disease is one of the most preventable health problems you could have. Here are some sobering numbers from the american heart association:

coronary artery disease is the single largest killer of american men and women,
600-thousand people die each year from heart disease,
only half of the people who die will ever have prior symptoms.

If you could stop the disease before it starts, or find out you're at risk — would you?

It could be as easy as taking a test. Take a look in "the calcium test". We have tests to find breast, prostate and colon cancer early. And there are tests to determine if you're at risk for heart attack.

But you can't get many of them without a doctor's order. Except one.

All it takes is a few minutes. A couple of passes through a c-t scanner and you could have the early answer to your risk of coronary artery disease. This is the calcium test.

From scan — to screen, you can see exactly what's lurking in the main arteries around your heart. "This is one of the main vessels coming out from the heart — provides flow to the left ventricle and you can see all of this area here is calcified plaque," says Dr. Patrick Rheingans.

He's a diagnostic and interventional radiologist at radiology group in davenport, and one of the doctors here who goes over the images the C-T scan produces.

"What we do, is we go through the study, we look at all the calcium in the three main vessels."

On the image, calcium looks white, it's the "cap" over the build-up of fatty deposits in the heart. Dr. Rheingans thinks of those deposits like this.

"We can think of it as rusting of pipes."

And the calcium cap over the rust?

"It's like spackling covering a hole in dry-wall."

A protective measure that can turn deadly.

"That calcified plaque is more stable and less likely to rupture but as it keeps accumulating, it can result in narrowing in the vessel."

Narrowing that restricts blood flow.

"The calcium is just the tip of the iceberg. Once we get a score, we can say that there is plaque. If calcium is there, we know there's plaque there."

This patient had a calcium score of 431 — high for a man his age — 61. But the test gives more than just a score. "We get two pieces of information. The raw score and the percentile rank."

From here, this patient will go on to get more testing with heart specialists — even going as far as cardiac catheterization. "The cardiac catheterization which would be the next step after that — that is where we're looking for true senosis of the lumin -- or the hole in the straw."

To get there, you can start witht he CT scan — and do it without waiting for your doctor to order the test. "People are taking their own health into their own hands and saying gosh, am I at risk or aren't I at risk and they want to know more information for peace of mind."

Information that can make a life and death difference.

"We want as many people to get this done as possible ... If we can catch disease early, we can help to save lives." The test is very easy — and very quick. In part two of the calcium test, we'll walk you through the test and score and tell you who doctors think should get the test. You'll also meet a man who wanted to know his risk and find out his score.

Radiology group offers the "c-t heart score test" for calcium for $295. Again, you don't need a doctor's order for the test. ^ return to top

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