Healing Heart Disease Naturally (eBook)

Shyam Aggarwal, a 45-year-old businessman, woke upone morning with a constricting feeling in the chest. After a while, as the pain subsided, he passed it off as a bout of indigestion and went to work as usual. A few hours later his secretary found him collapsed over a cup of coffee, with a cigarette burning a hole through the papers on his desk. Shyam was moved to a hospital where an ECG revealed a heart attack. A few weeks later a thoroughly shaken Shyam was back at work. He could not believe that he had a heart attack and was totally confused as to what he should do about it. His doctors advised him to have a bypass operation immediately or otherwise he could have another attack any moment. Rather than being railroaded into surgery he called in a senior cardiologist for a second opinion who told him that as for now, medication would be enough. Later, if he required it, an angioplasty would be enough. He decided to wait and learn more about heart disease by reading on the subject and talking to a doctor friend, who told him about the possibility of reversing his heart disease using a programme of diet, exercise and lifestyle changes. He gave him an article describing the Ornish programme. His cardiologist burst into laughter when Shyam broached the subject of reversing his heart disease with a programme of diet and exercise and said it was a waste of time. Shyam's doctor friend encouraged him to try the programme he had nothing to lose and at worse it would decrease the chances of another attack. Shyam went to work on a programme similar to the one in this book. A few months later he went back to see the cardiologist who had initially recommended the bypass surgery. His cardiologist could not believe the changes in Shyam's thallium stress test, which showed a reversal of the earlier abnormalities, and admitted that there was no need for any intervention at present. Three years on Shyam is back to playing tennis and swims for an hour daily. Ramesh, a 42-year-old teacher, started feeling breathless whenever he walked a short distance. He ignored this until he also started getting chest pain. A former basketball player, he could not believe that there could be anything wrong. His doctor made a diagnosis of angina pectoris and prescribed medication and asked him to have an angiography to determine the severity of blockages in the arteries of his heart. Ramesh was mortally afraid of medical procedures and said that he would rather leave his life in God's hand and refused to have an angiography when he heard that there was small chance of serious complications. Ramesh consulted Dr Nishant, a holistic physician trained in this approach, who had earlier helped him to give up smoking using hypnosis. Dr Nishant had observed that Ramesh was ambitious, power hungry and would get angry at the slightest provocation, simmering for days on end. Dr Nishant educated him of the link between personality and heart disease, starting him on the Pritikin diet and deep hypnotherapy to modify his personality. Within two weeks, Ramesh noticed that his chest pain had nearly vanished and that he could walk longer distances without discomfort. Within two months Ramesh was able to walk three miles at a brisk pace. A year later his exercise stress test was nearly normal and his physician allowed him to start playing basketball again. Six years later Ramesh is happy and content with no apparent evidence of heart disease.