Heart Disease: Lower your risk

Heart Disease is the number one cause of death for men and women in the United States. It is important to know that there are simple ways to help lower your risk of Heart Disease. These things can be incorporated into your daily lifestyle:

• Exercise for at least 30 minutes a day. This includes walking, jogging, or any cardiovascular movement.
• Drink alcohol in moderation (between 1/2-2 drinks per day)
• Maintain a diet rich in fruits and vegetables, cereals, fiber, lean proteins, and low in trans and saturated fats
• Do not smoke. Over time, quitting smoking can increase your life expectancy and decrease your chance of having heart-related complications.
• Have regular check ups from your primary care physician

Self Breast Exams

Yearly mammograms are the best way to diagnose breast cancer in its early stages, but there are steps you can take at home to help you detect breast cancer even sooner. Each month after your period (or at the same time each month if you no longer have periods), look for changes in the shape, look, or feel of your breasts. If you do detect any changes, let your health care physician know immediately.

Step 1: Lying down on a comfortable surface:

• Lie on your back with a pillow under your right shoulder
• Use the three middle fingers on your left hand to check your right breast
• Press using light, medium, then firm pressure in a circle without lifting fingers off of the skin
• Follow an up and down patter across the breast
• Feel for changes on your breast, above and below your collarbone, and in your underarm
• Repeat this sequence on your left breast using your right hand

Step 2: In Front of a Mirror:

Look for any changes from normal, then visually examine in 4 steps:

• Hold arms at your side and examine breast for changes
• Hold arms over your head and examine breast for changes
• Press hands on your hips and tighten chest muscles- look for any changes
• Bend forward with your hands on your hips and look for any changes

These are the things you should be looking for in addition to any other changes:

• Lumps, hard knots, or thickening
• Swelling, warmth, redness, or darkening
• Change in size or shape
• Dimpling or puckering of the skin
• Itchy, scaly sore or rash on the nipple area
• Pulling in of the nipple
• Nipple discharge that starts suddenly
• New pain in one spot that does not go away

It is recommended that women over the age of 20 should perform monthly self-breast exams. All women over the age of 40 should also have an annual mammography screening. To learn more about mammograms at The Imaging Center, click here.

  PET/CT and Alzheimer's Disease

Positron Emission Tomography (PET) is most frequently used for the detection and staging of cancer and for monitoring cancer therapy. PET is also instrumental in the evaluation of coronary artery disease and cardiac viability, and the assessment of neurological disorders. PET has also been approved by Medicare for use in diagnosing breast cancer and identifying metastatic disease.

In oncology, PET scans are used to detect cancer and examine the effects of cancer therapy by showing biochemical changes within a tumor. FDG-PET is a superior imaging technique used for staging Hodgkin's and non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, as well as staging lung cancer and other tumors.

In cardiology, PET scans can be used to determine blood flow to the myocardium and help evaluate coronary artery disease. PET can help differentiate nonfunctioning myocardium form functioning myocardium that would benefit from angioplasty or coronary artery bypass surgery.

In neurology, PET scans of the brain can be used to evaluate patients that have memory disorders of undetermined etiology, brain tumors, or seizure disorders that are not responsive to therapy.

PET/CT scans are especially beneficial in helping to differentiate Alzheimer's from other types of dementia. Because Alzheimer's disease is the most common cause of dementia in elderly patients, this technology can make a more accurate diagnose of the disease so that steps can be made to provide the patient with a higher quality of life. Although Alzheimer's cannot be accurately diagnosed until after death, PET/CT, along with other methods can predict Alzheimer's with %90 accuracy.