Cardiovascular Disease

Question 1

What is coronary heart disease ?

Answer 1

when the coronary arteries that supply the blood to the muscle of the heart get blocked by layers of fatty materials building up. This causes the arteries to become narrow, so blood flow is restricted and there’s a lack of oxygen to the heart muscle - this can cause a heart attack

Question 2

What are stents ?

Answer 2

Tubes inserted inside of persons arteries , help to keep it open, making sure blood can pass through to the heart muscles. This keeps the persons heart beating.

Question 3

How do stents help coronary heart disease ?

Answer 3

Way of lowering the risk of a heart attack in people with coronary heart disease.

Question 4

Advantages and disadvantaged of stents

Answer 4

Advantages : effective for long time and recovery time from surgery is relatively quick

disadvantages : risk of complication during operation and risk of infection from surgery.
Risk of patients developing a blood clot near the stent = thrombosis

Question 5

What is cholesterol ?

Answer 5

essential lipid that your body produces and needs to function properly. However, too much of certain types of cholesterol can cause heart problems.

Having too much of this ‘bad’ cholesterol in the blood stream can cause fatty deposits to form inside arteries, which can lead to coronary heart disease.

Question 6

What are statins?

Answer 6

drugs that can reduce the amount of ‘bad’ cholesterol present in the bloodstream. This slows down the rate of fatty deposits forming.

Question 7

Advantages of statins

Answer 7

1) by reducing the amount of ‘bad’ cholesterol in the blood stream , statins can reduce the risk of strokes coronary heart disease and heart attacks

2)as well as reducing the amount of ‘bad’ cholesterol , statins can increase the amount of a beneficial type of cholesterol ( HDL ) in your blood stream. This type can remove bad cholesterol from the blood

3) Some studies suggest statins may also help to prevent other diseases

Question 8

disavantages of statins

Answer 8

Statins are long term drug that must be taken regularly. There’s the risk that someone could forget to take them

Statins can sometimes cause negative side effects, e.g. headaches
Some of these side effects can be serious e.g. kidney failure, liver damage and memory loss

The effect of statins isn’t instant . It takes time for their effect to kick in