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Progress In The Treatment Of Heart Disease
With heart disease being such a major killer and trying to control the disease an ever increasing problem, this is one disease that has a huge impact on the health services and on private health insurance companies alike.
Government programmes have been abundant in trying to educate the masses into how to look after their hearts. From advice about exercise and diet to their constant funding of medical research into prevention and cures, the Government have made it a constant mission to overcome one of the UK's biggest killers.
In amongst this research comes the news from scientists that they have managed to halt the advance of heart disease in mice. With new, ground breaking treatment, some of the effects of heart disease can even be reversed.
The findings, published in the journal, Nature, show that genetic material called microRNA plays a major role in the development of heart disease - whatever the original cause. To target this material in heart cells and block it is key to being able to stop heart disease reaching its final conclusion.
The job of this material is to regulate gene activity but there are many different types. micorRNA-21 is the one that they are concentrating on. These play a strong part in a heart cell called cardiac firbroblast - the building blocks of the actual heart structure. They are a key factor when it comes to progressive scarring.
Scarring has always been believed to be irreversible and is a major problem after a heart attack. Blocking the chemical signalling pathway of microRNA-21 in animals has shown that the damage can be halted and even reversed to a degree.
Tests on humans are still a few years away yet but the potential for a new drug is there. Once these drugs pass stringent and lengthy tests, they will be available though health services and possibly private health insurance companies, for those with heart conditions.
The University of Texas Southwestern Medical Centre have scientists dedicated to the research of microRNA and are immensely excited about these findings, according to Professor Eric Olson.
With the UK having one of the highest annual death rates from heart disease (one adult dies every three minutes) and another 70,000 lives claimed each year from stroke alone, this breakthrough is a major occurrence.
Heart attacks, heart disease and strokes occur for various reasons. Those with a very fatty diet or who smoke will experience a build up of cholesterol (fat in the blood) and this blocks the major arteries to the heart causing the blood flow to become restricted to the point of heart attack. With strokes this build up occurs normally in the brain, with smaller blockages being the main problem.
So far, heart disease has been irreversible and once the damage is done, little more can help it other than to try and manage the problem, a problem that has thus far simply progressed, affecting more and more people in the process. Private health insurance companies will be as pleased as the patients themselves to see that true progress is being made in the prevention of such a disease as it is the ongoing care in heart disease patients that causes the financial impact.
About the Author Shaun Parker is a leading healthcare expert with many years of experience in cardiology. Find out more about private health insurance at http://www.health-on-line.co.uk |
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