Welcome to QAS

- A trusted name in home and professional diagnostic device sales, service, technical support, insurance reimbursement assistance, distribution and education for over 7 years.

From the FDA

New Guidelines for Cholesterol Patients Released

Patients who have recently experienced a heart attack should aim for even lower cholesterol levels than previous recommendations, according to new guidelines published in the journal of the American Heart Association. In the past, such patients sought to bring their LDL levels down to 100. Now, in light of cumulative research findings on the topic, patients are advised to lower their LDL's to 70.

Cholesterol can be both good and bad, so it is important to learn what cholesterol is, how it affects your health and how to manage your blood cholesterol levels. Understanding the facts about cholesterol will help you take better care of your heart and live a healthier life, reducing your risk for heart attack and stroke.

To control your cholesterol, get a cholesterol screening, eat foods low in saturated fat and cholesterol, maintain a healthy weight, exercise regularly and follow all your healthcare professional's recommendations.

Dramatic reductions can be achieved with drug therapy and careful monitoring, even among the most high risk patients. Heart patients can use statin drugs --including Lipitor -- in higher doses or combine statins, which block formation of cholesterol, with drugs that block cholesterol's uptake by the body.

Created by the National Cholesterol Education Program, the guidelines are endorsed by the American Heart Association, the American College of Cardiology and the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute. A panel of the education program examined five major studies involving cholesterol-lowering medicines.

Every year, 1.2 million people in America have a new or repeat heart attack. As of 2001 there were about 36 million people who could benefit from drugs to lower their cholesterol. The LDL guideline of 70 is for people who have just had a heart attack or those who already have cardiovascular disease plus diabetes, are persistent smokers and have high blood pressure, or other multiple risk factors.

Reuters.com.uk

Back to top

Anticoagulation News

Stress Correlated with Heart Disease

A recent study found that chronic stress increases patients' risks for both heart attacks and strokes. Researchers found that among more than 13,600 men and women followed since middle-age, those who reported chronic stress at the study's outset faced a somewhat higher risk of fatal or non-fatal heart disease or stroke over the years. The link was strong only among men, although a weak relationship between stress and cardiovascular ills was found in women.

Stress is the "wear and tear" our bodies experience as we adjust to our continually changing environment; it has physical and emotional effects on us and can create positive or negative feelings. As a positive influence, stress can help compel us to action; it can result in a new awareness and an exciting new perspective. As a negative influence, it can result in feelings of distrust, rejection, anger, and depression, which in turn can lead to health problems such as headaches, upset stomach, rashes, insomnia, ulcers, high blood pressure, heart disease, and stroke. With the death of a loved one, the birth of a child, a job promotion, or a new relationship, we experience stress as we readjust our lives. In so adjusting to different circumstances, stress will help or hinder us depending on how we react to it.

Researchers have long studied the possible role of chronic stress in heart problems and stroke, with many studies supporting a relationship. It's thought that constant stress may take a toll on the arteries in a number of direct or indirect ways, from causing chronically high levels of stress hormones to pushing people to maintain unhealthy habits like smoking.

The new study included middle-aged men and women who between 1974 and 1980 were questioned about their stress levels over the previous one to five years. They were then followed through 1999 to see who developed cardiovascular disease. The researchers found that participants who reported chronic stress at the study's start were 14 percent more likely to develop heart problems or suffer a stroke, regardless of other factors such as family history, body weight, smoking and high blood pressure.

Men's risk of fatal stroke showed the clearest relationship to stress; stressed-out men were twice as likely as their peers to die of a stroke.

Eurheartj.org

Back to top

Medicare News

Medicare Covers Alzheimer's Test

The U.S. Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) recently expanded Medicare coverage to include reimbursement for Positron emission tomography (PET), the scan that tests for Alzheimer's disease. Private insurers are likely to follow this move by CMS to improve diagnosis and care for seniors who experience early symptoms of this degenerative illness. PET can image living brain cells in "real time" to give an idea of which areas are most active at any given time. Combined with the right computer software, they can be used to show areas damaged by the tangles and toxic protein buildups that mark Alzheimer's.

Alzheimer's is the most common cause of dementia. It affects 4.5 million Americans, including former President Ronald Reagan who died earlier this summer with the disease.

It can be diagnosed with some certainty using pen-and-paper tests, but the only definitive diagnosis is made after death by looking at the brain.

Medical professionals and patients' families agree that earlier diagnosis of Alzheimer's is preferable. Although there is no cure for the disease, drugs and vitamin B12 can slow its progression. The sooner these treatments are administered, the more brain function the patient can maintain.

Washingtonpost.com

Back to top

New Treatment

New Pump Prevents Pain

The Food and Drug Administration recently approved a new implantable pump for people who experience chronic pain. The device, developed by Medtronic Inc., delivers medication directly into the spinal chord and can be used to treat pain associated with multiple sclerosis, cerebral palsy, and stroke. Patients report fewer side effects when medication is administered via pump, instead of orally.

What is Chronic Pain?

While acute pain is a normal sensation triggered in the nervous system to alert you to possible injury and the need to take care of yourself, chronic pain is different. Chronic pain persists. Pain signals keep firing in the nervous system for weeks, months, even years. There may have been an initial mishap -- sprained back, serious infection, or there may be an ongoing cause of pain -- arthritis, cancer, ear infection, but some people suffer chronic pain in the absence of any past injury or evidence of body damage. Many chronic pain conditions affect older adults. Common chronic pain complaints include headache, low back pain, cancer pain, arthritis pain, neurogenic pain (pain resulting from damage to the peripheral nerves or to the central nervous system itself), psychogenic pain (pain not due to past disease or injury or any visible sign of damage inside or outside the nervous system).

Oral pain medications cannot target the exact origin of pain and carry several adverse side effects. The new pump targets the medication's site of action in the spinal cord, thereby minimizing the dose requirements and side effects compared to oral administration of the same drugs.

Approximately 50 million Americans live with chronic pain today, according to the Joint Commission on the Accreditation of Health Care Organizations (JCAHO). It is the number one cause of adult disability in the United States. Pain costs the United States an estimated $100 billion in lost productivity every year, according to a JCAHO report.

Businesswire.com

Back to top

Life Style

Western Diet Boosts Stroke Risk

A recent study found that diets common in western culture increase risk for stroke. Specifically, a diet rich in red meat, white flour, and sugar raises the likelihood of stroke. A team of researchers from the Harvard School of Public Health studied more than 71,000 nurses. They found those who ate a "prudent" diet rich in fruits, vegetables, fish, legumes and whole grains were less likely to have strokes than nurses eating a more typical American diet.

Health experts already say a diet high in animal fat, especially red meat, and low in fiber, fruits and vegetables raises the risk of heart disease, diabetes, some cancers and obesity. Stroke is the third-leading cause of death in the United States, killing nearly 170,000 people in 2003.

The researchers began studying 71,768 female nurses aged 38 to 63 in 1984 who had no history of heart disease or diabetes. They followed them until 1998, dividing them into two groups - "prudent" and "Western" eaters. Each group was further divided into fifths, depending on a woman's reported eating pattern.

There were 791 strokes during the 14-year study period. The women who ate the "worst" Western diet had a 58 percent higher risk of stroke than women who ate the healthiest diets. The nurses with Western eating habits were also more likely to smoke, less likely to take vitamins and to be less active, the researchers found.

Add in other risk factors and the news gets worse. Risk of ischemic stroke -- when a blood clot blocks an artery or blood vessel in the brain -- was four times higher for smokers whose diets most closely resembled the Western diet compared to nonsmokers whose dietary habits strayed from that eating pattern.

Women with high blood pressure whose diets closely mimicked a Western-style pattern had a threefold risk of ischemic stroke compared to women who were not hypertensive and did not stick to the red meat-and-sweets regime.

After adjusting for lifestyle and other stroke risk factors , women with the highest Western diet scores were at nearly double the risk of developing any type of stroke compared to those with the lowest scores for that diet. Similarly, risk of ischemic stroke was nearly double among women with the highest Western diet scores vs. those with the lowest.

A "prudent" diet characterized by higher intakes of fruits, vegetables, fish, legumes and whole grains may protect against stroke.

Several foods and nutrients have been linked to the risk of stroke; therefore, dietary modification may be an important way to reduce the risk of stroke. Because nutrients and food are consumed in combination, their cumulative effect on disease risk may be best investigated by considering the entire eating pattern.

Forbes.com

Back to top

Research Talk

Stem Cells Help Heart Attack Patients

Recent research demonstrates another possible benefit of stem cells: heart disease treatment. After a heart attack, stem cells taken from a patient's own bone marrow can improve heart functioning. In a study conducted in Germany, sixty patients were treated either with stem cells taken from their own bone marrow, or with the best conventional treatment. After six months, it was found the hearts of those who received the stem cell transplants were working better.

Stem cells have the capability of turning into any other cell. In this case, scientists believe they turn into new blood vessel or heart muscle cells. Patients who undergo the procedure have stem cells taken from their own bone marrow and injected directly into the heart muscle. Because the stem cells come from the patient's own body, the transplant will not be rejected.

Since stem cells can develop into many different cell types, it is not surprising that scientists are enthusiastic about their potential use for tissue repair and regeneration in patients with various diseases. There is a great deal of excitement and controversy in the field of stem cell biology, with intense debate regarding whether adult stem cells, which come from specialized tissue, can efficiently develop into cell types different from those found in tissue from which they have been isolated. The term used to describe the ability of adult stem cells to change from one cell type to another completely different cell type is referred to as the plasticity of adult stem cells.

A part of the challenge in carrying out scientific research is that even when using exactly the same reagents and the same cell donor, two independent groups can sometimes obtain different, even contradictory results. This is a common and accepted phenomenon in research, which is why results reported by one group have to be replicated by at least one other group before being accepted as valid by the community. Often, groups reporting contradictory results openly discuss problems and exchange reagents. This has been somewhat neglected because of the high stakes and potential benefits in the stem cell research field. Also, the entire debate has gained much more public attention than it would have in other research fields.

The researchers found that the treatment had improved the functioning of the heart's left ventricle by 7%. In comparison, the patients given the best medical therapy but no transplant saw a 0.7% improvement in their condition. The scientists said the beneficial effects could not be explained solely by bone marrow cells transforming into heart muscle. Instead they believe the stem cells promoted the secretion of chemicals by heart tissue that encouraged growth.

Researchers from the University of Freiberg, where the study was conducted, state that larger trials are needed to further understand these effects.

Heartcenteronline.com

Back to top

Fitness Watch

New Study Shows Importance of Prostate Screenings

When doctors diagnose prostate cancer, they typically assess the level of prostate-specific antigen (PSA) in the patient's blood. A new study, however, found that the PSA level itself may be less important than how the level changes over time. Men whose PSA levels rose rapidly over time before diagnosis were more likely to die from prostate cancer. How fast PSA level increased in the year before prostate cancer was diagnosed predicts which tumors are deadly nearly 10 times better than the PSA level itself.

Results from this study could influence how doctors determine treatment plans. Specifically, because changes in PSA predict the cancer's aggression, doctors have better information when deciding whether to operate immediately. Also, since researchers emphasize that the change over time is what matters, patients are urged to complete regular screenings. In this manner, doctors can take note of any trends before aggressive cancer develops.

The new study, reported in the New England Journal of Medicine, followed 1,095 men, 65 years old on average, who had prostate cancer; they received PSA screenings at least once a year and underwent prostate surgery between 1989 and 2002.Twenty-eight percent of the men whose level rose more than 2 points the year before diagnosis died of prostate cancer within seven years, despite having the gland and adjacent lymph nodes and seminal vesicles surgically removed. The findings make clear which patients need aggressive treatment, but not which ones can safely be monitored through repeated testing.

Guidelines call for annual PSA tests beginning at age 50, or 45 for men with a family history of prostate cancer. Researchers from this study suggest a baseline PSA level should be determined at age 35 to spot changes.

Content.nejm.org

Back to top

Product of the Month

Power Chairs and Mobility Products

Innovative Mobility, a division of QAS, provides a variety of power chairs, scooters and mobility products for active adults who want to keep their freedom and independence.

Medicare filing assistance is provided at no charge along with quality customer care, support and service.

Back to top

Copyright ©2003 QAS, Inc. All rights reserved. The information provided in this Newsletter and on the Hometestmed site is intended for your general knowledge only and is not a substitute for professional medical advice or treatment for specific medical conditions.