Empowering Patients to Take Care of Their Hearts

Hypertension affects about 103 million Americans, according to the American Heart Association (AHA). Atrial fibrillation (AFib), which is often associated with hypertension and could affect up to 6 million people per CDC statistics, can be asymptomatic, so patients may be unaware they have it. The CDC also reports that more than 600,000 Americans die each year from heart disease, and coronary artery disease is the most common type of such disease. Also impacting the heart is diabetes—and more than 100 million Americans suffer from it, the CDC reported. “Heart disease is the number one killer,” Dave Albert, MD, founder and chief medical officer at AliveCor, told MD+DI, adding that the above-mentioned conditions are “all interrelated.” AliveCor is working to prevent the impact of heart disease by enabling patients to monitor themselves through portable EKG monitors. Earlier this year the company earned new indications, making it the only consumer-cleared device with the ability to detect the three most common heart arrhythmias (bradycardia, tachycardia, and AFib) plus normal sinus rhythm. AliveCor has also partnered with Omron Healthcare, known for its patient-friendly blood pressure monitors, to incorporate its EKG technology into Omron Complete for at-home monitoring of both blood pressure and EKG in one device—described as the first ...
Source: MDDI - Category: Medical Devices Authors: Tags: Cardiovascular Source Type: news