Testing For Disease

May 14, 2009

Interview with Dr. James Elrich Director of Colorado Heart & Body Imaging

www.coloradoheart.com

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Mike Carruthers:

Diagnosing heart disease is hardly an exact science.

Dr. James Elrich:
85% of people who get a heart attack would have been considered at low risk by their doctor in the weeks prior to that devastating event. And these people would have passed their stress test.

Dr. James Erlich, Medical Director of Colorado Heart and Body Imagining…

Because the first symptom for about 35% of the people is sudden death when it comes to cardiac disease. And the very first manifestation of heart disease in over 50% of people is irreversible - either sudden death or a heart attack.

Yet there are tests for early detection of heart disease and some cancers that Dr. Erlich says are very accurate but you don't hear much about them because insurance doesn't pay for them.

Managed care waits for you to have a diagnosis or symptoms. And most of the tests that we've made available for the early detection of lung cancer, colon cancer, heart disease are not covered by insurance because you don't have symptoms or a diagnosis yet.

Dr. Erlich believes we need to get away from this idea of only going to the doctor when something's wrong.

Just as we do mammography, we don't wait for symptoms of breast cancer we do screening. Then in the cardiology and many other areas of medicine we need to look for the earliest evidence of disease and that takes high technology.

To hear the complete unedited interview, click here.