With the polyclinic last week and the University Hospital on Thursday, Poitiers is fully participating in the study carried out by the French Society of Cardiology on the relevance of more systematic screening for heart failure.
Detecting heart failure is as simple as… a drop of blood. However, this disease causes 70,000 deaths each year in France. And it would affect nearly 1.5 million people. The conditional is necessary because, in the absence of systematic screening, this figure is only a reflection of epidemiological estimates. To compensate for this imprecision, the Heart Failure and Cardiomyopathy Group (Gicc) of the French Society of Cardiology launched an unprecedented study in twenty-five public and private health establishments. Called DEPIC FR, it extends between October and December in the form of information and screening days. One of them took place last Tuesday at the Poitiers polyclinic, another is planned for Thursday at the University Hospital. What could be better than a hospital hall to reach the population in all its diversity.
The test, open to adults, excluding pregnant women or diagnosed heart patients, consists of taking a drop of blood from the tip of a finger, then passing the sample through a machine to measure the presence of NT-proBNP. The blood dosage of this biomarker, when it is greater than 125 ng/ml, reveals the existence of a dysfunction in the heart. In 15 to 20% of cases, the test turns out to be positive. From there to immediately conclude that there is a weakness… “There are false positives, possible for other reasons such as arrhythmia…”warns the Dr Barnabas Gellen.
The cardiologist, member of the French Society of Cardiology, campaigns for the test to be systematized during any consultation with the cardiologist. Because unfortunately heart failure knows how to be discreet. Certainly there are contributing factors such as tobacco, diabetes, high blood pressure, cholesterol, obesity, sedentary lifestyle or stress, without forgetting the heredity factor. But heart failure has the particularity of sharing its symptoms – shortness of breath, weight gain, edema and fatigue, combined under the acronym Epof – with other pathologies. “ The symptoms of heart failure are also those of other diseases, or of aging, notes Dr. Gellen. It’s not like a heart attack, the symptoms of which are very specific. This lack of specificity explains the lack of screening. » But it is better to know because, reassures the specialist, “Most often, we can control the symptoms of the disease and its progression with a healthy lifestyle and medications that limit shortness of breath and relieve the functioning of the heart.”
Heart failure screening day, Thursday November 14, from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m., in the hall of the cardiovascular center of Poitiers University Hospital.
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