Getting to the Heart of Cardiovascular Disease Through Testing
Cardiovascular disease — a classification of illnesses that involve the heart or blood vessels — can lead to heart attack, stroke, arrhythmia (abnormal heartbeat), cardiomyopathy (enlarged, thickened, or stiffened hearth muscle), and coronary artery disease (aka, atherosclerosis and hardening of the arteries). In fact, one person every 40 seconds or so in the U.S. dies from cardiovascular disease.
In our experience, conventional medicine offers only short-term, band aid solutions for heart disease, including the following:
- If your blood pressure is high, your doctor is likely to prescribe one or more medications to lower it, which is a good idea to prevent stroke.
- If your high-density cholesterol level is high, your doctor is likely to prescribe a medication to lower it.
Most medications target one or more causes of cardiovascular disease, but they do not target the root causes, which may include hidden infections, nutrient deficiencies, hormone imbalances, mental or emotional stress, or other factors or combinations of factors.
Results from today’s next-level tests, such as those we offer at BioDesign Wellness — Tampa’s Functional Medicine practice — in coordination with the Cleveland HeartLab, give us insight into the causes of inflammation in the heart and blood vessels, so that we can pursue a more proactive and longer term approach to correcting and preventing inflammation, which underlies cardiovascular disease and many other chronic health conditions.
Once we understand a patient’s complete genetic profile and advanced cardiac markers, we can devise a plan that not only reduces the risk of developing a serious cardiovascular disease but also helps, in many cases, reduce the need for pharmaceutical medications, which can often cause or contribute to other health complications and issues.
The tests we offer in coordination with the Cleveland HeartLab can be broken down into three categories, each of which is covered in greater detail later in this post:
- Inflammation tests
- Advanced lipid tests
- Advanced cardiovascular tests
Inflammation Tests
If you’re a candidate for a study of your body’s inflammation, advanced testing is used to evaluate your inflammatory state and cardiovascular risk. The tests we recommend can detect inflammation early or identify advanced stages. Our objective is to catch inflammation as early as possible and start treating it before it becomes a bigger problem.
The inflammation tests we order include the following: continue reading
