Baltimore County, MD Hello Baltimore County, 1 Feb 2018

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From YouTube: A Heart to Heart with the Doctor

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Baltimore County's top doc, Dr. Gregory Wm. Branch, shares valuable heart disease prevention and treatment advice.

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Welcome to hello! baltimore county., I'm ellen kobler.

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heart disease is the number one cause of death. Worldwide,.

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And in the united states,, it's responsible for one in every four deaths.

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The statistics are scary,, but baltimore county's top doc,.

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Doctor gregory branch, is here with some good news about prevention and treatment.. Thank you so much for joining us.. Thank you for having me, ellen.

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Well, we hear all the time about heart, disease.

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What is heart, disease?.

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Well, you know,. When you look at heart disease,, you can look at heart disease from different perspectives,, but basically, heart disease is an illness or a sickness of the heart.

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It can be a valvular problem..

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It could also be a muscular problem, like if somebody had cardiomyopathy.

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And the muscles are not working.

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usually,. When we talk about heart, disease,, we're talking about the coronary artery disease.

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All the vessels surrounding the heart.

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and when they get clogged up,, that's when a person has a heart attack.

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And is that the same thing as cardiovascular disease...

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Exactly. ...as well as coronary artery?.

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Cardiovascular disease,, coronary artery disease, is the disease of those blood vessels.

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And specifically, the blood vessels around the heart.

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so,, like so many things,, I'm guessing some of it is hereditary,.

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But a lot of it is based on your daily habits.

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exactly. so,. You can think of it from a nature to nurture perspective.

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Naturally,, your age,, you can't do anything about, right?

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no,, we try,, but it doesn't work.

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Or your family history,, you can't do anything about, and that's okay..

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And then what happens is the thing that you do. so,, a person could have diabetes.

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a person could have high blood pressure., the person could be overweight.. There are certain things that you can have, and you can do something about that..

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I think it's extraordinarily important not to confuse the nature and nurture.

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Some people say, you know, diabetes, runs in my family.

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And then I say, that's because no one in your family, runs.

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so, you've got to be careful that you might have diabetes.

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You might have high blood pressure that runs in your family,.

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And there's nothing you can do about the family history of that,, but there are a lot of things you can do about those diseases..

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What are some of the specific risk factors for heart, disease?.

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Well, specifically, high blood, pressure, diabetes,.

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A family history,, a person having an elevated cholesterol,.

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A person who's age over the age of 55, if they're, an american.

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Those are some of the risk, factors, and so,. The fact that you have a family history, the fact that you're over the age of 55, there may not be much we can do about that,, but you can try to keep your sugars under control,. Keep your weight under control,.

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And keep your blood pressure under control.

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and those are very good things that you can actually do.

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now,. How much of a factor is smoking?.

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The previous segment, dan young was talking about quitting smoking.

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How much is smoking a factor?.

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Smoking is a huge, huge,, huge factor.

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When it comes to heart, disease. and so,, if you can cut down your smoking,, if you can quit smoking,.

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It will save your life from a coronary artery disease, perspective.

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So,, you mentioned blood pressure as a risk. Factor.

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What's a healthy blood pressure?, how do you know?.

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Well,, you think of it usually as 120,, which is the top number.

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So,, it's not like over 80,, which is the bottom number diastolic.

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Anything under that, within reason, is fine.

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Very, very low blood pressures are not good,, but when you start getting to the top number at 140 and that bottom number over 90,.

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That's when you're talking about high blood pressure., you should always have your blood pressure. Checked.

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You can check it at the doctor's office,, but you know what?.

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You can check it in the grocery store,. The supermarket.

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The drugstore. yeah.

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You can go to the pharmacy any place that has those.

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Check your blood pressure,, because hypertension is the silent, killer,.

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Meaning,, you don't know that you have high blood, pressure.

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ellen:, you can't feel it. and then what happens? Is the person has a heart attack or something like that,.

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And then we subsequently learn that they had high blood pressure and didn't know. oh,. My goodness.

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So,, what can people do to prevent heart, disease?.

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I think the best thing you can actually do is listen to your heart.

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I said: listen to your heart, because in between the h-e-a-r-t is an e-a-r.

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That's an ear. so,, listen to your heart.

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so, e eat, right.

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eat more fruits and vegetables,. I think it's very, very important.

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I think, when you're starting to think about your nutrition or things like that,,.

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That's always,, always,, always very important, and always talk to your doctor.

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And we used to hear a lot about fats and saturated fats.

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Now,, it seems like the bugaboo is carbohydrates.

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Right. so, what happens, you've got to be very careful.

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Of the different diseases that you have. so,, if a person has diabetes,, you want to really watch those carbohydrates..

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If a person has certain heart, disease,.

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They may want to watch the amount of fats that you intake and the type of fats.

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So,, I think it's always important to be able to go and speak to your doctor.

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Or nutritionist about that., but when you're listening to your heart,, it's e-a-r.

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And the a stands for really, always ask your doctor about your cholesterol,.

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Your high blood pressure, and your sugar., and I think that the r is very, very important.

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ellen: all right.. I can't wait to hear what the r is. and it's basically saying, relax. relax., and that's good for medication and get a good amount of sleep. Every night.

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Just relax, because stress can induce coronary artery disease.

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Ellen: oh, my goodness. and where does exercise play into all of that?.

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I think exercise is always very, very important..

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It can be a part of that e also., you can eat right, and you can exercise..

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I think exercising is as simple as taking the stairs up one or two flights.

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And walking down the stairs., that would be very helpful when it comes to your exercising.

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ellen: so,. It doesn't necessarily have to be running a marathon?.

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No. or joining a gym or anything like that at all.

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Whatever you can do. you know,, you can park a little further away when you're going to the supermarket.. Isn't that funny? we always want the closest spot,.

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But we're also thinking that we want more exercise.

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so, actually, just park a little further away.

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Just park a little further away., it's less of an ordeal, and you can actually take that walk,.

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And that's great exercise simple,, yet very, very effective.

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All right. so, heart disease in general.

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Let's just kind of do a little bit of a recap: here.

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Who is susceptible?, how do they know it?.

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And what can they do to prevent it?.

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Right. so, overall,, if you have a person who lives in america.

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And they're over the age of 55,, they are susceptible.

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anybody who's had a person in their family, who's had heart, disease,,.

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Specifically, at a young age,, less than 60 years, old,.

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They're susceptible., but there are conditions that you may have that make you more susceptible,.

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Like diabetes,, elevated cholesterol,, hypertension, smoking,, those types of things.

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so,, the whole point in all this is to modify what you do.

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Be very, very conscientious of all your medical numbers,.

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And you want to eat right., you want to exercise..

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You always want to go to your doctor and ask them about your numbers.

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That's very, very important. and then, relax.

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So,, it sounds like it really comes down to basic daily habits.

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If you make a couple of changes, like for example,, one thing that I know that I do, is, I actually pack little snacks.

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To take into the office,, because otherwise, you're hitting a vending machine, or you know,, you get really hungry, and you don't care what you want to eat. so, I'll, take a little baggy of carrots or some grapes,.

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And you know, it's actually nice to have that sort of thing.

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And that's always so important., you know why? because it amazes me. people are surprised...

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that they're hungry., that they're hungry. we get hungry every day, and people are surprised that they got hungry.

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so,, don't be surprised. just pack a snack, and then,. I think, that you'll be actually eating much more healthier.

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All right. well, doctor,, thank you, very, very much.

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Thank you, ellen. and thank you for watching hello! baltimore county..

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We encourage you to connect with baltimore county government on all of our social media, platforms.

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