Introducing the 纪念收藏: A century of cardiology progress

If you had serious heart disease a century ago, there's a good chance doctors 将n't tell you — but 将 通知朋友或亲戚.

That was the advice of a prominent medical textbook of the 1920s, an era when heart disease "prevention" was a fledgling concept focused on the development of acute rheumatic fever, which can lead to deadly heart damage.

And the threshold then for high blood pressure? 高达160/95毫米汞柱.

In this week's issue of Circulation, the 美国心脏协会's flagship journal, 杰出的心脏病专家. Eugene Braunwald kicks off the AHA's centennial year with a 鸟瞰视角 of cardiovascular conditions as they were understood in 1924.

Braunwald, of Brigham and Women's Hospital and Harvard Medical School, also outlines key developments in a century of cardiology. At age 94, he has witnessed much of it.

The field's transformation is "breathtaking,布劳恩瓦尔德写道, noting crucial progress in understanding and preventing cardiovascular risk factors as well as advances in procedures, 成像, 设备和药物.

Much work remains to be done, he says, but "we truly stand on the shoulders of giants."

Dr. Braunwald's article is featured in the 美国心脏协会 journals' 纪念收藏.