Category: Heart Disease

“The handwriting was on the wall,” says sister-in-law Patricia of pop star legend Whitney Houston’s death by accidental drowning — with cocaine use and heart disease listed as contributing factors.

It had been possible to forecast that drugs would claim the singer’s life, she told the Agence France Presse after a coroner’s report released on March 22 showed that drowning was the main cause of Houston’s death — but that this was aggravated by atherosclerotic heart disease, that in turn was worsened by her chronic cocaine use.

Houston was found dead in a Beverly Hilton Hotel bathtub on February 11, a day before the Grammy Awards and hours ahead of a glittering pre-awards party in the hotel where she died.

Continue reading “Cocaine Worsens Heart Disease (Atherosclerosis): Whitney Houston Case”

Higher heart attack risk from Pradaxa, study shows: Here’s a note of caution for those who are taking blood thinners to manage atrial fibrillation or prevent stroke after a hip or knee replacement.

Patients taking the new anti-clotting drug Pradaxa have a higher risk—from 22 percent to 33 percent—of heart attack or severe symptoms of heart disease than do patients taking the older blood thinner, warfarin, a meta-analysis of various reports says.

That’s the range of relative increase in risk compared to other blood thinners—but the absolute risk increase for suffering a heart attack was only 0.27 percent, clarify the authors of the meta-analysis published online in the Archives of Internal Medicine Jan. 9 issue.

Continue reading “Pradaxa Bleeding and Higher Heart Attack Risk?”

Viagra and Healthy Hearts: Viagra Keeps Cerys Small Alive. A ten-month old baby girl, who battled three open-heart surgeries in the first months of her life, is being kept alive by daily doses of Viagra.

Cerys Small, who lives with her family in Maesglas, Newport, South Wales, was born with a severe heart defect, no spleen and problems with her stomach and bowel. Her condition is kept stable by the anti-impotence drug.

Viagra it is best known as drug for men who have trouble having erections, but before scientists realized it could treat this sexual dysfunction, it was initially designed as a heart drug. And for people like Cerys it is still used to treat pulmonary hypertension to prepare for further major heart surgery.

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