Preventive Care to Keep Your Heart Healthy
Heart disease continues to be the most common form of disease and the No. 1 cause of death for both men and women — accounting for one out of every four deaths. Just because heart disease is prevalent, however, doesn’t mean it’s a certainty or that it can’t be prevented. In fact, the Center for Cardiovascular Prevention, Metabolism and Lipids at Georgia Heart Institute specializes in providing key resources and services to keep your heart at its healthiest.
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Our program, often called “the Prevention Center” for short, uses physical activity, culinary medicine and advanced screenings to help patients with:
- Managing heart disease risk factors, including lipids.
- Identifying diseases in their earliest, most treatable stages.
- Continuously improving quality of life after a cardiac event or disease diagnosis.
What is Cardiac Wellness?
At every stage of life, your heart has different needs. Plus, it requires continuous support and ongoing care to function at its best. Everything from routine physical activity, nutritious foods, management of risk factors and key diagnostic services and screenings are consistently needed to maintain and protect heart health.
Whether you’ve been diagnosed with heart disease or not, cardiac wellness means keeping your heart as healthy as it can be — and it looks different for each person. For some, it may mean preventing the onset of disease and proactively screening for heart conditions. For others, it may involve complementary services that make clinical care and treatment even more effective long term.
Ultimately, cardiac wellness is about prolonging and improving quality of life for everyone.
There are many different forms of heart disease that can affect everything from the coronary and peripheral arteries to the electrical system or structure of the heart. Common risk factors include:
- Family history of cardiovascular disease
- Smoking
- Sedentary lifestyle (lack of exercise)
- Being overweight or obese
- High cholesterol
- High blood pressure
- Age
- Diabetes
Treatment Pathways
The Center for Cardiovascular Prevention, Metabolism and Lipids at Georgia Heart Institute has experts who specialize in the diagnosis and treatment of specific forms of heart disease to improve your wellness and prevent the development of more severe heart disease. Most often, we treat patients on the following pathways of their heart health journey:
Primary Prevention
For patients who haven’t experienced any cardiac issue and have no pre-existing conditions but want to understand their current and future heart health needs and their risk factors, like family history. Learn more.
Lipid Therapy
Our well-established lipid clinic offers a wrap-around approach to help patients lower their cholesterol, with therapies for patients who simply cannot lower their cholesterol through the standard options: statins and lifestyle changes. We also offer advanced lipid testing such as Apoliprotein B (ApoB), Lipoprotein A (LpA), cholesterol particle count, and cholesterol absorption markers for those interested in more precise lab measurements. Learn more.
Cardiometabolic Therapy
Our cardiometabolic therapy program offers new classes of treatment that can make a significant impact in reducing the risks related to heart disease for Type 2 diabetics. Learn more.
Integrated Prevention Services
The Center for Cardiovascular Prevention, Metabolism and Lipids provides an expansive array of services designed to support every patient throughout their entire heart health journey. From disease prevention and advanced diagnostics to ongoing care for heart disease, our experts tailor each service and treatment to provide an experience that is unique to you and your needs.
Advanced Diagnostic Services
Effective heart disease prevention and treatment start with precise and specialized diagnostics. By utilizing the most advanced and innovative imaging services and tests, our preventive specialists are able to pinpoint specific risk factors for heart disease, while also detecting disease in the earliest stage possible — before you ever experience symptoms. A few of the advanced testing services you may receive:
This test, which is also called a “heart scan,” uses a CT scan to measure the amount of calcified plaque in the coronary arteries. The calcium score is used to predict the likelihood of a coronary event.
A test that utilizes contrast and a CT scan to provide detailed images of the heart and determine if there is any narrowing of the coronary arteries.
A non-invasive heart test used to produce a personalized 3D model of the coronary arteries to measure blood flow to the heart and identify blockages.
Using sound waves to produce images of the body’s arteries, a vascular ultrasound can be used to detect and diagnose blockages and blood clots in arteries throughout the body.
Blood pressure is an important indication of blood flow throughout the body. This test measures blood pressure in the ankle and the peripheral arteries. ABI is compared to blood pressure measured in the arm to determine whether blood flow is slowed in the legs.
A comprehensive blood test that measures all the fats, or lipids, that are present in the blood. This typically includes total cholesterol, high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL), low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL) and triglycerides — all of which can impact heart and vascular health.
Family history can be a major risk factor contributing to the likelihood of an individual developing heart disease; however, many individuals may not know their complete history. Testing for certain disease biomarkers allows experts to identify inherited genes for specific types of heart disease and the likelihood of developing the disease.
Integrated Partnerships
Heart health is one facet of overall wellness – it impacts other parts of the body and vice versa. As a vital part of an interconnected system, maintaining heart health and preventing disease must account for the full range of factors and conditions a patient may have. In addition to preventative cardiac specialists, we collaborate with experts from endocrinology, rheumatology, bariatrics, primary care, psychology and more, to fully address every aspect of your health.
Why Choose Georgia Heart Institute?
Georgia Heart Institute’s Center for Cardiovascular Prevention, Metabolism and Lipids brings together expertise from non-invasive cardiology, culinary medicine, wellness coaching, cardiopulmonary rehabilitation and more to deliver a holistic and comprehensive experience. This highly trained team of prevention experts helps patients better understand their heart health, while also providing the expert guidance, advanced diagnostic testing and ongoing care needed to achieve and maintain long-term cardiac wellness.
The Center for Cardiovascular Prevention, Metabolism and Lipids is different from other cardiology programs. Here’s how:
- During your visits, you’ll see not only your cardiologist or advanced practice provider (APP) but also a registered dietitian nutritionist and a wellness coach. These three specialists work together to create a treatment plan for your unique needs.
- It’s not just a “once every six months” thing. To help keep you on track with your health goals, you’ll have a consistent point of contact to help you navigate your care. This navigator can help you access other specialized services within Georgia Heart Institute, if needed.
- You’ll also have the opportunity to participate in activities with other patients, like our walking club. We also have a Facebook Group to share information and inspiration and answer your questions.
- We have a dedicated specialist to handle prior authorization for certain novel treatments. This means you can focus on your health while our expert handles arrangements with your insurance provider.
Connect with Our Program
The Center for Cardiovascular Prevention, Metabolism and Lipids does not require a physician referral for you to make an appointment. However, we do prefer a referral for insurance purposes. Your insurance provider might require a referral to cover your visit. To get started, call the center at 770-219-0960 or click the button below.
