Passing on Bypass Using External Counterpulsation: And FDA Cleared Alternative, to Treat Heart Disease Without Surgery, Drugs or Angioplasty! [Paperback]

Just in case you haven't yet heard, the traditional route of treating severe coronary artery disease (angiograms, angioplasty, stents and ultimately bypass surgery) has been shown convincingly to not be all it is cracked up to be. And there are life saving alternatives with proven track records which, combined with the correct diet and modest exercise, can actually reverse your problem, not just "bypass" one inch it.

This book is the only one I am aware of on the market to explain one of the key components of this approach to heart disease, ECP. And ECP is the only therapy to date which improves angina. IF YOU OR SOMEONE YOU LOVE HAS ANGINA ALREADY, YOU MUST READ THIS BOOK IMMEDIATELY.

ECP is treatment where pressurized cuffs are placed around your lower legs and pelvis, and hooked up to a computer that is controls the process. When your heart beats and the blood is rushing out of your heart, the cuffs relax, allowing blood flow to your pelvis and legs. After this beat has finished, while your heart "regroups" for its' next beat, the cuffs contract, milking the blood out of your legs and pelvis to force it back into your heart. This increases the blood flow to the small arteries in your heart that provide the blood flow to the heart muscle itself (coronary arteries). This treatment has been shown in a number of studies to be very effective for the treatment of angina, and, in fact, over a series of treatments can allow angina patients to increase their activity level and get off nitroglycerin and other pain remedies for angina. ECP WORKS. ECP has been shown to be effective in a number of studies, including one large multicenter placebo-controlled study (MUST-EECP, J Am Coll Cardiol. June 1999).

ECP works by promoting the development of collateral circulation to your heart. Rather then have one large artery supply your heart, you "grow" other very small vessels to the size that they can give your heart the blood it needs.

Most patients who are currently undergoing angiograms, angioplasties, stents and bypass surgery would do just fine with dietary change, medical treatment of their heart problem, chelation therapy, and, if they have angina, ECP. It is not likely that your cardiologist will tell you that.

This book also points out why that is so. In addition to the obvious profit motive, the book explains that "we have trained too many cardiologists and in order for these cardiologists to keep up their certification they must perform a minimum number of procedures per year."

"Patients are often unnecessarily scared into surgery when the doctor shows them the angiogram and announces 'this artery is what we call a 'widow maker', it is a critical lesion, if we don't operate you will be dead by Christmas, you are a walking time bomb'. You may be shocked to find out that these scare tactics are not supported by the scientific research. As you will read later, a physician cannot tell by looking at an angiogram whether a blockage will cause a heart attack or not! And just as important is the little known fact that the risk of death or heart attack is only 2% per year in patients with stable coronary disease. This statistic is so poorly known that most physicians, when asked what they believed the patients risk of death or heart attack to was, gave the wildly inflated estimates of 15% to 50% per year. When this 2% per year heart attack rate is compared to the 4% to 8% risk of death from bypass surgery, a startling fact is realized. The surgical cure for coronary artery disease can be more deadly than the disease itself."

THE BEST PART OF THIS BOOK is that the book reviews, one paragraph at a time, the published literature on the results of the traditional angiogram, angioplasty, stent and bypass surgery "train" (once a patient gets on the train, it is difficult to get off) and gives you the information you need to make an informed decision with facts your cardiologist may not be anxious for you to know:

"it was found that angioplasty patients had 90% more deaths and heart attacks than those patients receiving only medical therapy. Even more significant was that the risk of death, heart attack, or coronary artery bypass surgery was 42% lower in the patients that had medical therapy instead of angioplasty." (RITA-2, Lancet 1999).

"We believe that the illusion of cardiology is that bypass or dilatation of coronary stenosis reduces the risk of myocardial infarction." (James S. Forrester, MD [Cedars Sinai Medical Center] Circulation 1977).

Ultimately, the decision of whether or not to submit yourself to an angiogram, angioplasty, stent, and/or bypass surgery is a personal decision that only you can make. You need to know that each step leads to the next. Unfortunately, most of us "in the heat of the moment" won't take the time to slow the Medical Industrial Complex down enough for us to weigh all of our options. This book is well written, an easy read, and a contains a pile of information you will find difficult to piece together elsewhere. If you or a loved one has a heart problem (including a history of previous bypass surgery or angioplasty) please read this book AND Bypassing Bypass Surgery (Dr. E Cranton) to get the other side of the story. And read them now, before you are in an emergency situation and everyone is yelling at you to hop on the Medical Industrial Complex train.