you may not be aware, but heart failure claims the lives of more than 200,000 americans every year. now, there s a new drug that promises to reduce the strain on a failing heart and may help it cover. dr. siegel want to start with you. what are we talking about? is it available now? it s actually just finished being studied. it s going to be available in 2015. it s very exciting because it cut down on death from heart failure by 20% in the study compared to another usual drug we use. the reason is heart failure is when your heart heart is the biggest pump in the body. when that pump is failing you have a problem and you back up fluid into your lungs. one of the reasons it fails is a heart attack. there are other reasons it fails. if you have a failing heart if the arteries are constricted, if
this medication that s made by novartis, it s gone through the clinical trials and it s very promising because it can reduce the death from heart failure by 20%. it s a huge success. and it s a huge leap in this field. how it works is it takes a little bit of the pressure off the heart while it promotes some of the muscle. can you explain the difference between heart failure and having a heart attack? the heart attack is basically when you have blockage of your arteries, the blood is not going to get to the heart. as a result those muscles just like stroke, now the blood is not going to get to the organ and you re going to have part of that pump that s going to die. can you have heart failure without a heart attack? absolutely. if you damage enough of that heart muscle you get heart failure. you can also get it from drinking too much. it s called holiday heart.
go past normal overeating? the problem with us is this starts the season and constantly at work, people are bringing food and we re eating. the statistics show there is an increase from the end of november to january. increase number of deaths, heart attacks. i mean if you have heart problems and you overindulge in salty food, high-fat food to increase blood pressure and send you many to heart failure. that is an issue. then there is holiday heart, if you really do binge drink over the holidays it can irritate your heart and cause arrhythmia. so you really have to use moderation. more than anything else. shannon: that is always good advice. another thing that a lot of people find stressful that happens this time of year is the shopping. we see the people on black friday. physically, literally, there is a threat sometimes of people trampled and running over. you can have stress for other ways, debt and the fighting shoppers. in the economic climate, everybody worries there is unem