Spotlight: Cardiovascular Disease Screening &Prevention: Biomarker Lipoprotein (a)
If you have friends and family members who are interested in screening for lipoprotein(a), please let them know they can order their own lab screening test for $24 on Precision Lab Panels.
Lipoprotein(a) screening with cholesterol, blood sugar and blood pressure screening.
Up to 20% of population has elevated lipoprotein(a) and it is an uncommon screening test at annual exams.
There is data that shows that patients with elevated lipoprotein(a) might benefit from taking a daily dose of baby aspirin.
Recommended Podcast & Resource
Cardionerds: A Cardiologist Podcast
MESA Risk Score and Coronary Age Calculator
PMC Notable Patient Cases/Findings
31 y/o otherwise healthy male who read “Outlive” by Dr Peter Attia earlier this year and then ordered himself a direct-consumer continuous glucose monitor (CGM). He subsequently noted his blood sugars were trending in the 300mg/dl range! Seen in the ER and diagnosed with adult onset type 1/type 2 diabetes: HbA1C >13%! He’s now being treated by an endocrinologist with Metformin and insulin (low dose) while making dietary changes. He’s dropped his HbA1C by >50% in three months! He met with Dr Johnson and learned that he has vitamin d deficiency and undetectable levels of estradiol with lower than optimal testosterone levels and percent body fat <10%. Dr Johnson ordered a DEXA scan which showed that he has osteopenia.
This is a great case to highlight the value of preventive health testing to identify and treat medical conditions before people present with symptomatic disease.
Prevention is the best medicine and so many of us don’t know our risk of chronic disease/aging because we “feel” reasonably healthy.
Chicago Office Update!
Dr. Deepti Agarwal and Dr. Catherine Johnson are now seeing patients at the Chicago Fulton Market office. It’s such a great, urban space and we are so excited to welcome our patients to this office. Here is a sneak peek at the new office space!
Check out the newest office reel here!
Other Personal/Practice Updates
Dr Johnson’s 79 y/o mother was recently diagnosed with colon cancer. Please be sure to report any symptoms of irregular bowels, weakness and fatigue. If you feel something, say something! It’s likely that she will make a full recovery with surgery and precision cancer treatment but there was certainly an opportunity to make the diagnosis earlier
Life is precious and we all have cancer cells in our body, our goal is to keep the cancer cells from proliferating as our immune system fights to clear abnormal cells from our body.
Healthy nutrition, good sleep, healthy relationships, active movement, faith, purposeful work and time in nature are all vital to living an “optimal healthspan” lifestyle.
The cicadas are very active and noisy, especially outside the front door at the Clarendon Hills office! If you hear some yelps and screams, it’s just Dr Johnson shaking cicadas off her head and body!
