Nutrition, metabolism, and cardiovascular diseases : NMCD
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Nutr Metab Cardiovasc Dis · Aug 2003
Citizens and family doctors facing awareness and management of traditional cardiovascular risk factors: results from the Global Cardiovascular Risk Reduction Project (Help Your Heart Stay Young Study).
The numerous guidelines and multiple approaches to managing cardiovascular risk factors have reduced the number of fatal events but not the incidence of cardiovascular disease (CVD). One rarely explored aspect is the extent to which individuals perceive their own risk in relation to their education and history of CVD. Furthermore, Italy has a State-based Health System, in which family doctors (FDs) may be an extremely useful and relatively low cost resource for risk management, but the degree of their involvement in individual CVD risk management has not been previously assessed. ⋯ The results of our study suggest that the awareness of CVD risk among subjects is somewhat vague. The FDs were generally able to provide a quantitative assessment of CVD risk in their patients. CVD risk prevention programmes may be more successful if they stress knowledge and awareness in the population, and stimulate FDs to undertake more stringent quantitative assessments of CVD risk factors.