Astoria doctors work to improve heart health

Published 8:00 pm Thursday, May 5, 2016

Two Astoria practices are working to improve the cardiovascular health of patients.

Lower Columbia Clinic and Pacific Family Medicine have joined Healthy Hearts Northwest: Improving Practice Together, an initiative designed to help hundreds of small and mid-sized medical practices throughout the region lower their patients’ risk for heart disease.

More than 100 practices in Oregon are enrolled in the study.

Healthy Hearts Northwest is part of a national effort to help small medical practices prevent heart disease, our nation’s biggest killer.

“Doctors can do a lot to help people lower their risk for heart attacks and stroke,” said Michael L. Parchman, a Group Health Research Institute senior investigator and director of the MacColl Center in Seattle, Washington.

It’s called ABCs:

• Aspirin: Use if you have a history of cardiovascular disease

• Blood-pressure control

• Cholesterol control

• Smoking cessation

Primary care practices in the Astoria area still have the chance to join Healthy Hearts Northwest: Improving Practice Together, which is part of the national EvidenceNOW: Advancing Heart Health in Primary Care initiative, sponsored by the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality.

It builds on the U.S. Department of Health and Human Service’s Million Hearts initiative, with a goal to prevent a million heart attacks and strokes nationwide by 2017.