Tidelands Health offering Heart Scan coronary artery calcium scoring

April 18, 2016

About 735,000 people in the United States will have a heart attack this year, and more than 100,000 of them will die.

A new service available at Tidelands Health can help you understand your risk for coronary artery disease and heart attack. Called Heart Scan, the test measures the amount of calcified plaque build-up in coronary vessels, which is an accurate predictor of heart attack risk.

The amount of calcified plaque helps determine an individual’s Heart Scan score. The painless, non-invasive screening takes only 15 minutes.

Candidates for Heart Scan typically have no known heart disease but do have at least one of the following risk factors: between the ages of 45 and 85, smoke, are living with high blood pressure, diabetes or high cholesterol, have a family history of heart disease, are overweight or obese and are physically inactive.

The test, which is offered at Tidelands Waccamaw Community Hospital and at Tideland Georgetown Memorial, costs $150 and requires a physician referral. Results are read by a board-certified radiologist and provided to your family physician. For more information, visit www.tidelandshealth.org/heartscan

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