Holidays can be hard on the heart. The top days for heart attacks throughout the year are Dec. 25, 26 and Jan. 1. Americans also have a tendency to eat and drink too much this time of year, triggering “Holiday Heart Syndrome.” For heart failure patients, the holidays can be an especially tricky time. Limiting fluid and salt intake…

At 58, Mike Pulzer was starting to slow down, but didn’t know why. “I used to stay up until midnight and wake up at 6am and be fine,” Pulzer says. “Then all of the sudden by 4pm I was done for the day, exhausted.” The normally energetic retirement community executive noticed he was also losing his…

The American Heart Association Sessions are underway in Los Angeles, California this week, presenting a record 28 late-breaking trials, many with potential to impact clinical practice. Director of the Cardiac & Interventional Laboratories at Oklahoma Heart Institute, Dr. Wayne Leimbach is attending sessions and reporting findings as they break. One trial receiving early attention and…

Two large arrhythmia trials were presented at the American Heart Association Sessions this week, which could significantly impact clinical practice.  Oklahoma Heart Institute participated in both national, multi-center randomized trials, the BLOCK HF trial and MADIT-RIT trial.  Oklahoma Heart Institute cardiac electrophysiologist, Dr. David Sandler explains the impact of these findings for patients, “whether through…

November 15 is the Great American Smokeout, a date the American Cancer Society hopes motivates smokers to make a plan to quit or actually stop smoking on that day.  According to recent studies, the number of Americans smoking has remained unchanged from 2010 to 2011, progress stalled as compared to the smoking decline reported from 2005…

Smoking is the roulette of health gambles. Watching the wheel spin, the marble ball bounce over red, then black until finally stopping on the final number, you never know what you are going to get. You could smoke for a lifetime and escape lung and heart disease. You could be the casual smoker with a…

Atrial Fibrillation (AFib), the most common heart arrhythmia affecting up to 5 million Americans, is now linked to an increased risk for sudden cardiac death, according to a recent study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. The association was studied in two population cohorts, finding the risk triples for those with incident AFib and…

The news stories seem to be running together these days on the latest findings on the prevalence of diabetes in America. We have reported on the latest in diabetes management and how this growing epidemic will affect not only our country, but specifically our state in the very near term. We know that by 2050, 1 in…

Judy Marshall is making a difference in her community as a result of surviving two heart attacks. When her heart took her off the road, Marshall decided to channel the energy she put forth into driving a truck across the country into her hometown one project at a time. Here is her Oklahoma Heart Institute…