Saliva will tell you about the health of your heart

Heart disease arises as a result of the combination of genetic, environmental and lifestyle risk factors. Conventional health checks like cholesterol, blood pressure, blood sugar and ECG sometimes fail to detect risk of heart disease adequately. To give more accurate reading of a person's heart, a new device, which can detect risk of heart diseases by analyzing DNA from saliva/cheek cells, was launched on Tuesday in Bangalore, India.

The device-Jai Heart-launched by city based Jai Health is said to be the first genomic based risk estimation solution for heart disease developed specifically for Indian, South-east Asian and Middle East population. The device provides an overall estimate of an individual's susceptibility to developing heart disease.

"This device is integrated with the client's medical history and conventional risk factors provided online registered at www.jaihealth.com. A detailed personalized report is produced, which estimates the risk of developing heart disease, highlights an individual's risk factors and outlines what the client can do to prevent heart ailments.

"Importantly the use of genomic in this test can give a signal of risk long before heart disease becomes symptomatic. This will help clients and their doctors initiate the necessary lifestyle changes, further investigations and medical interventions to reduce the risk of a heart attack," said Dr Sanjay Kakkar.

He said that the process is straightforward and following online registration the client receives a kit via courier containing a saliva/cheek cell collection tube, which is simple, non-invasive and easy to use. The kit is then posted back to the Jai Health for analysis at its laboratory. The client is informed electronically when the report is ready to be viewed and downloaded from its website.