Heart failure beware of the winter

GREATER KAILASH, India - Nov. 14, 2013 - PRLog -- Several studies have found a seasonal pattern of deaths from heart attack and sudden death, with more fatal events occurring in the winter than the summer said Padma Shri and Dr BC Roy National Awardee Dr KK Aggarwal President Heart Care Foundation of India.

A similar seasonal variation has been seen in men and women with chronic heart failure.

In a large study from France, deaths from heart failure peaked during the winter months of December and January.

The distribution of monthly deaths differed by up to 35 percent when January was compared to August, which is when deaths were the lowest.

Hospitalizations for HF followed the same seasonal pattern, with a winter-spring predominance.

Approximately one-fifth of the excess in winter admissions has been attributed to respiratory disease.

However sudden death in patients with heart failure does not follow a circadian rhythm, in contrast to the circadian variation (most deaths between 6 AM and 12 PM) seen in the occurrence of out-of-hospital sudden death or acute heart attack in the general population.

About HCFI : The only National Not for profit NGO, on whose mega community health education events, Govt. of India has released two National Commemorative stamps and one cancellation stamp, and who has conducted one to one training on” Hands only CPR” of 71933 people since 1st November 2012.

The CPR 10 Mantra is – “Within 10 minutes of death, earlier the better; at least for the next 10 minutes, longer the better; compress the centre of the chest of the dead person continuously and effectively with a speed of 10x10 i.e. 100 per minute.”