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American Morning

New Study Has Worrisome Findings About Congestive Heart Failure

Aired November 05, 2002 - 08:42   ET

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.

THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.


CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Congestive heart failure was once considered to be a concern primarily for older people. A new study has worrisome findings. It says one person in five over the page of 40 could develop the potentially deadly disease. And another report about whether eating too much fish can be dangerous to your health, here to tell us more about that is our medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta.
Too much fish bad?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, can you imagine? You were trying to be healthy, doing all the right things, getting your protein, getting your nutrition. You're also getting methyl mercury, and that's what the "USA Today," the cover of the paper is talking about. We've heard about methyl mercury before. We've heard of canned tuna, for example, eating too much of that might be too bad. Mercury is released from power plants, gets into the water, it's converted to methyl mercury. That's a toxic kind. That gets into fish, and you know what happens then, we eat the fish.

COSTELLO: Nothing good.

GUPTA: Lots of things can happen. If you are getting too much of the mercury, hair loss, fatigue, depression, difficulty concentrating -- sounds like most people in the news business, headaches. But there are good fish and there are bad fish to eat if you are concerned about it. And you should be concerned about methyl mercury if you are a woman who could be potentially pregnant or if you are pregnant, or you're a young child.

COSTELLO: So what's the good fish? What's the bad fish?

GUPTA: The good fish, the fish that have low levels of mercury, salmon, cod, flounder, trout, lobster, clams, those are some good ones. The bad fish are typically the predatory fish. Those are fish that eat other fish, boosting up their levels of mercury even higher. Shark -- you eat a lot of shark?

COSTELLO: No.

GUPTA: Swordfish, tidal fish, king mackerel. Fish like that tend to be bad fish. So just a reminder, I guess, about methyl mercury if you are pregnant.

COSTELLO: It's getting to be scary to eat anything these days.

GUPTA: I know. It's still a good healthy food, just everything in moderation, I guess, right?

COSTELLO: That's right.

Let's talk about this congestive heart failure study, because this is scary, because I happen to be in that age group. But one in five over 40 could suffer from that and not even know it?

GUPTA: Right. See, the thing that's sort of interesting about this particular study is we hear numbers a lot about cancer risks. We hear that you have a one in eight chance of developing certain sorts of cancers. They haven't done those sort of statistical analysis before for congestive heart failure, and so this is the first time they've done it, one in five chance, as you mentioned, Carol, over the age 40 of developing congestive heart failure, particularly if you have high blood pressure, that risk doubles to two out of five. And these are all things we've sort of know, but these numbers are pretty dramatic.

Let's just remind people what congestive heart failure is and what typically causes it. I think we have animation that shows that, but what typically happens is the blood vessels, you can see there -- kind of a cool graphic -- the blood vessel expands and contracts. That allows blood to get through the blood vessels. That's sort of typical. What happens in hypertension is the blood vessels become stiff, and then when the heart is trying to pump against those stiff blood vessels, it's very hard to too do, the heart compensates by getting larger, and the muscle gets thicker, but after a while, the heart just can't compensate anymore. That's heart failure, and as the fluid starts to build up, that's congestive heart failure.

COSTELLO: How about some warning signs before you have to go? I mean, how can you tell if your heart is doing that?

GUPTA: Some of the initial warning signs can be very subtle. They can just be tiredness, can be fatigue, things like that. Again, right? Sounds like everybody in this news room.

COSTELLO: I'm becoming paranoid now. It become much more dramatic. Fluids can build up in the feet. As the fluid starts to builds up, you get the dema in the feet. It can also be difficulty breathing, especially at night, when people are lying flat on their back. A lot of times it's preceded by chest pain if somebody's having a heart attack, or if their blood pressure is quite high.

But the important thing is people talk about eating right and exercising, things like that, and I get a little tired of saying it, but 61 percent of this nation is overweight. A third of people who have high blood pressure, significantly high blood pressure, don't even know if they have it. There are some very basic, simple things that people can do to try to correct that stuff. Here you have a list of them: get your blood pressure tested, a low fat, low salt diet, don't smoke, limit alcohol. There are good medications out there. There is not a cure for heart failure, but there are good treatments out there.

COSTELLO: That's right, you can't prevent it. Exercise, exercise, exercise.

GUPTA: That's right. Good seeing you.

COSTELLO: Good seeing you, too.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com




Failure>


Aired November 5, 2002 - 08:42   ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CAROL COSTELLO, CNN ANCHOR: Congestive heart failure was once considered to be a concern primarily for older people. A new study has worrisome findings. It says one person in five over the page of 40 could develop the potentially deadly disease. And another report about whether eating too much fish can be dangerous to your health, here to tell us more about that is our medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta.
Too much fish bad?

DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Yes, can you imagine? You were trying to be healthy, doing all the right things, getting your protein, getting your nutrition. You're also getting methyl mercury, and that's what the "USA Today," the cover of the paper is talking about. We've heard about methyl mercury before. We've heard of canned tuna, for example, eating too much of that might be too bad. Mercury is released from power plants, gets into the water, it's converted to methyl mercury. That's a toxic kind. That gets into fish, and you know what happens then, we eat the fish.

COSTELLO: Nothing good.

GUPTA: Lots of things can happen. If you are getting too much of the mercury, hair loss, fatigue, depression, difficulty concentrating -- sounds like most people in the news business, headaches. But there are good fish and there are bad fish to eat if you are concerned about it. And you should be concerned about methyl mercury if you are a woman who could be potentially pregnant or if you are pregnant, or you're a young child.

COSTELLO: So what's the good fish? What's the bad fish?

GUPTA: The good fish, the fish that have low levels of mercury, salmon, cod, flounder, trout, lobster, clams, those are some good ones. The bad fish are typically the predatory fish. Those are fish that eat other fish, boosting up their levels of mercury even higher. Shark -- you eat a lot of shark?

COSTELLO: No.

GUPTA: Swordfish, tidal fish, king mackerel. Fish like that tend to be bad fish. So just a reminder, I guess, about methyl mercury if you are pregnant.

COSTELLO: It's getting to be scary to eat anything these days.

GUPTA: I know. It's still a good healthy food, just everything in moderation, I guess, right?

COSTELLO: That's right.

Let's talk about this congestive heart failure study, because this is scary, because I happen to be in that age group. But one in five over 40 could suffer from that and not even know it?

GUPTA: Right. See, the thing that's sort of interesting about this particular study is we hear numbers a lot about cancer risks. We hear that you have a one in eight chance of developing certain sorts of cancers. They haven't done those sort of statistical analysis before for congestive heart failure, and so this is the first time they've done it, one in five chance, as you mentioned, Carol, over the age 40 of developing congestive heart failure, particularly if you have high blood pressure, that risk doubles to two out of five. And these are all things we've sort of know, but these numbers are pretty dramatic.

Let's just remind people what congestive heart failure is and what typically causes it. I think we have animation that shows that, but what typically happens is the blood vessels, you can see there -- kind of a cool graphic -- the blood vessel expands and contracts. That allows blood to get through the blood vessels. That's sort of typical. What happens in hypertension is the blood vessels become stiff, and then when the heart is trying to pump against those stiff blood vessels, it's very hard to too do, the heart compensates by getting larger, and the muscle gets thicker, but after a while, the heart just can't compensate anymore. That's heart failure, and as the fluid starts to build up, that's congestive heart failure.

COSTELLO: How about some warning signs before you have to go? I mean, how can you tell if your heart is doing that?

GUPTA: Some of the initial warning signs can be very subtle. They can just be tiredness, can be fatigue, things like that. Again, right? Sounds like everybody in this news room.

COSTELLO: I'm becoming paranoid now. It become much more dramatic. Fluids can build up in the feet. As the fluid starts to builds up, you get the dema in the feet. It can also be difficulty breathing, especially at night, when people are lying flat on their back. A lot of times it's preceded by chest pain if somebody's having a heart attack, or if their blood pressure is quite high.

But the important thing is people talk about eating right and exercising, things like that, and I get a little tired of saying it, but 61 percent of this nation is overweight. A third of people who have high blood pressure, significantly high blood pressure, don't even know if they have it. There are some very basic, simple things that people can do to try to correct that stuff. Here you have a list of them: get your blood pressure tested, a low fat, low salt diet, don't smoke, limit alcohol. There are good medications out there. There is not a cure for heart failure, but there are good treatments out there.

COSTELLO: That's right, you can't prevent it. Exercise, exercise, exercise.

GUPTA: That's right. Good seeing you.

COSTELLO: Good seeing you, too.

TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com




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