Reviewing the all-in-pod heart health segment

BY ANISH KOKA The All-in podcast is a fairly popular show that features successful silicon valley investors commenting about everything worth commenting on from politics to health. The group has good chemistry and interesting insights that breaks the mold of the usual tribal politics that controls legacy media analysis of current events. Last week, the podcast touched on a topic I spend a fair amount of time on: Cardiology. Brad Gerstner, who is actually a guest host for this particular episode starts off by referencing something called Heartflow to evaluate the heart that has been recommended by one of the other hosts: Chamath Palihapitiya. Brad apparently asked his primary care physician about Heartflow and was instead directed to get a calcium scan. Heartflow is a proprietary technology that purports to evaluate the presence of significant narrowing in the coronary arteries just by doing a heart CT scan. A calcium score is a low-dose CT scan used to identify the presence of calcium in coronary vessels. The segment ends with a recommendation for everyone over the age of 40 to get some type of heart scan, so I thought it would be worth reviewing some of the main claims. Question 1. Does Brad need a calcium scan? Brad notes that his primary care physician told him he was young, fit, and had a low bad cholesterol (LDL) and needed a calcium scan rather than a heart flow scan. The answer to this question and the questions to follow depend on what outcom...
Source: The Health Care Blog - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Medical Practice All-in Podcast Anish Koka Brad Gerstner cardiology Source Type: blogs