Preventative Cardiology

Most heart attacks are not bolts from the blue — they are the end result of coronary disease developing silently for years, and in around half of cases the first "symptom" is the heart attack itself. Yet cardiovascular disease is the most preventable of all serious illnesses. Preventative cardiology asks three questions: what is your individual risk, is there disease already present in your arteries, and what — specifically — should you do about it?

I spend much of my week treating advanced heart disease in the catheter lab — which is exactly why I take prevention seriously. Almost every heart attack I treat was, at some point years earlier, preventable.

You do not need symptoms to benefit from assessment. It is particularly worthwhile if you have:

• A family history of heart disease — especially a parent or sibling affected at a young age
• One or more risk factors — high blood pressure, raised cholesterol, diabetes or pre-diabetes, current or previous smoking, or excess weight
• A high-pressure lifestyle — long hours, stress, poor sleep and little time for exercise
• Reached your 40s or 50s without ever having your heart properly assessed — a common and entirely reasonable prompt
• A borderline result elsewhere — a raised cholesterol reading, a blood pressure "to keep an eye on", or a health-screen finding you want properly interpreted

This is not a tick-box screening package. It is a consultant-led assessment built around you, in three parts:

1. Understanding your risk A detailed consultation covering your personal and family history, lifestyle and full risk factor profile, together with a physical examination and baseline checks in clinic. This conversation is the foundation of everything that follows — your risk cannot be understood from test results alone.

2. Investigations tailored to you There is no fixed menu of tests, because the right investigations depend entirely on your history and risk profile. Following your consultation, I will outline which tests are appropriate for you and why — which may include blood testing, heart rhythm and blood pressure assessment, imaging of the heart, or scans of the heart's arteries. Equally important, I will tell you which tests you don't need: more testing is not better testing, and every investigation I recommend will have a clear purpose in answering your specific questions. 

3. A specific, personal plan You leave with a clear picture of your actual risk and a written plan: specific targets, treatment where the evidence supports it (and explicitly not where it doesn't), lifestyle priorities ranked by impact, and a sensible follow-up schedule. Prevention only works if the plan is one you can actually live with.

The evidence for prevention is among the strongest in medicine:

• Managing cholesterol reliably reduces heart attack and stroke risk — and the earlier it is addressed, the greater the benefit
• Treating high blood pressure protects against heart attack, stroke, heart failure and kidney disease
• Detecting silent heart disease early allows treatment that halts progression — years before symptoms would ever appear
• Identifying inherited risk changes management for you and, often, your relatives
• Lifestyle change, properly targeted, remains the foundation: activity, weight, diet, sleep and stopping smoking each carry measurable, compounding benefit

Prevention is not about medicalising healthy people. Many patients leave a preventative assessment reassured — with medication safely deferred — while others discover risk worth treating early. Both are good outcomes; what matters is that the decision rests on evidence about you.

• The interventionalist's perspective — I treat the end results of heart disease every week, and bring that experience to preventing them; I know exactly what we are trying to avoid
• Tailored, evidence-based assessment — investigations chosen for your individual history and risk profile, not a one-size-fits-all package
• Honest advice in both directions — treatment recommended where evidence supports it, and deferred with confidence where it doesn't
• PhD from King's College London and over 100 peer-reviewed publications
• Rapid access — same-week appointments at Heart Health Welbeck London (Marylebone), Cromwell Hospital (Kensington), The Wellington Hospital (St John's Wood), Bupa Health Care Canary Wharf, The Essex Cardiothoracic Centre (Basildon)
• Consultations in English and Turkish
• Recognised by all major private medical insurers; self-paying patients welcome

The best time to assess your heart is before it ever gives you a reason to. Contact my practice team to arrange a preventative cardiology consultation at one of my London or Essex locations.

Contact Ms Amelia Garner (PA) on 020 3198 9826 or drozandemir.sec@outlook.com to arrange a consultation.