Arte­ries — The sys­temic sup­ply network

Car­dio­vascu­lar pre­ven­ti­on is dis­as­ter prevention.

Ade­qua­te pro­tec­tion against dan­ge­rous vascu­lar blo­cka­ges starts with a pre­cise ana­ly­sis of the heart and arteries. 

Arte­ries

The sys­temic sup­ply network

Ever­ything stands and falls with the arte­ries: Their func­tio­n­a­li­ty is of immense impor­t­ance: Without them, the ent­i­re infra­st­ruc­tu­re of the body would fall by the way­si­de: After all, a func­tio­n­ing vascu­lar sys­tem that works without restric­tions has a signi­fi­cant influ­ence on our over­all health — and on how we age.

Accord­ing to their func­tion as blood ves­sels lea­ding away from the heart, arte­ries are respon­si­ble for sup­ply­ing the organs with oxy­gen-rich blood. At the same time, they trans­port nut­ri­ents and important mes­sen­ger sub­s­tan­ces to whe­re­ver they are nee­ded. If patho­lo­gi­cal­ly alte­red blood ves­sels can only per­form their sup­ply task to a limi­ted extent, the risk of life-threa­tening car­dio­vascu­lar events increases.

Dama­ged arte­ries are a seve­re threat

Often, arte­ries can only main­tain the oxy­gen-rich blood sup­ply to the organs to a redu­ced extent, main­ly due to blo­cking depo­sits and dama­ged inner walls. Then things are get­ting ris­ky for our health becau­se a fatal chain reac­tion is set in motion.

Immu­ne cells, for examp­le, often try to dis­lodge cho­le­ste­rol depo­sits from the walls of arte­ries — unfor­tu­n­a­te­ly without suc­cess. Ins­tead, the immu­ne cells get stuck in the arte­ry walls. The results are low-thres­hold inflamma­ti­ons and depo­sits, also known as athe­ros­cle­ro­sis plaques. A who­le seri­es of spe­cial immu­ne cells cal­led leu­ko­cytes are found in the­se plaques. If they are over­ac­ti­ve and block the walls of the blood ves­sels, they beco­me desta­bi­li­zed. This can result in plaques brea­king down and blo­cking blood flow — with dan­ge­rous con­se­quen­ces. Be it heart attack, cere­bral infarc­tion, or peri­pheral arte­ri­al dise­a­se (PAD), which pri­ma­ri­ly affects the legs, less fre­quent­ly the arms: the ori­gin is restric­ted, or, at its worst, com­ple­te­ly inter­rup­ted blood flow.

Unco­vering Car­dio­vascu­lar Risk Fac­tors — Pro­tec­ting Heart and Arteries

Car­dio­vascu­lar dise­a­ses with their some­ti­mes seve­re com­pli­ca­ti­ons, howe­ver, are not an ine­vi­ta­ble fate. The typi­cal dise­a­se cour­ses are well avo­ida­ble — if pati­ents act ear­ly enough,  taking coun­ter­mea­su­res and thus their car­dio­vascu­lar health in their own hands. 

In order to ide­al­ly pre­vent car­dio­vascu­lar events and secon­da­ry dise­a­ses com­ple­te­ly or to tre­at alrea­dy exis­ting patho­lo­gi­cal con­di­ti­ons effec­tively, an ear­ly, pre­ven­ti­ve car­dio­vascu­lar dia­gnostics is indis­pensable. The more pre­cise the collec­ted car­dio­vascu­lar data are, the more care­ful­ly tar­ge­ted the fur­ther medi­cal tre­at­ment can be tailo­red to the dif­fe­rent needs of each pati­ent. In the best case,  vascu­lar exami­na­ti­ons are repeated at cer­tain inter­vals: One the one hand, che­cking car­dio­vascu­lar health, and, on the other hand, if necessa­ry, to con­trol and moni­tor the initia­ted the­ra­py steps con­tin­ous­ly to keep one’s eye on the pro­gress of the dise­a­se. If patho­lo­gi­cal chan­ges alrea­dy exist, tar­ge­ted inter­ven­ti­ons at least miti­ga­te the cour­se of the dise­a­se and pre­vent worse. For examp­le, in nar­ro­wed coro­na­ry arte­ries, first-line the­ra­py are vascu­lar sup­por­ting stent implan­ta­ti­ons. The ear­lier pati­ents take care of their car­dio­vascu­lar health, the less likely it is having to under­go such and other stress­ful and high-risk ope­ra­ti­ons. Knowing your indi­vi­du­al car­dio­vascu­lar risk pro­fi­le thus hel­ps to main­tain qua­li­ty of life and can save lives.