Mosaic talks Heart Health Month

We will be c1 we're back on "live at five" with sherry nelson.

She's from the home services department.

A lot to talk about today because you're joining us during american heart month and as we were talking, there's so much to this subject.

Where do we begin?

>> first of all, since it's heart month.

It's important everybody gets their calcium score.

It's a $50 test.

That is, the gold standard is a cardiac cath.

This is the next best thing.

It shows your coronary arteries and flags it if you need further testing.

That can get you tested before at heart attack.

>> if you're having warning signs, get to the er.

>> this is a preventative test to see your heart is doing.

>> i know you said this, even more important than knowing you're bmi.

So, knowing that, can we walk into any cathlab and say hey, can i have this done?

>> no, you have to get it at the imaging center.

The $50 test, the calcium or heart score.

>> you can walk in.

>> you can walk in and make an appointment.

It's 50 bucks.

No insurance.

>> have you seen that save a whole bunch of lives?

>> i have seen women's lives more than anybody else get saved from this.

You know more women have or more men have heart disease, more women die from heart disease.

I have seen a big shift in our women having open heart surgery as a result of getting this test done.

>> yeah, they recommend 45, 40 to 45 to get this test done.

However if you have any symptoms of heart disease or in your family, if you're sedentary or stressed.

Those are all things you need to consider getting a cardiac score.

If it's just something that can be fixed by diet and exercise, you know you're going to know before you get into having a really big heart disease that will require surgery or medicine or something like that.

>> everything happens at 40.

I see your button for 40 years.

I see your cardiac button.

>> this is not my age but how long i have been doing my job.

I feel like at 40 it's when things start to happen.

>> it does.

That's your baseline.

That's your baseline.

You can get it done now.

If you're 40 and get it done and your score is zero, you can wait a couple years.

You know that you've got a good baseline.

It's zero and that's great.

That saves lots of lives, especially women.

I just could talk forever about that because it's so important.

>> we have many more topics to talk