Savannah Researcher Puts $500,000 AHA Grant to Work in Shopping Malls and Clinics

“Dr. Neil Gordon of Savannah’s St. Joseph's/Candler Health System is using his $500,000 Patient Care Research grant from the AHA to put some of the newest risk- reduction research into places where it will do the most good, like shopping malls.

“We’ve set up a 17’x17’ kiosk in a shopping center to reach our moderate risk heart disease patients,” he says.  Dr. Gordon, Director of the Center for Heart Disease Prevention at St. Joseph's/Candler Health System, is using recent research from Stanford University that shows that aggressive treatment of risk factors in people with low-to- moderate levels of cardiovascular disease can slow down the progression of the disease as much as 40% and, in some cases, even reverse it.  The Stanford study treats cardiovascular disease using very low-fat nutrition, smoking cessation, exercise, blood pressure management and extensive testing.  “We’re looking at three different risk management settings,” Dr. Gordon said.

“The first is a standard cardiac rehab setting; the second uses a hospital but with non-physician personnel such as nurses, nutritionist, and physical therapists.”  The third uses the same personnel, Dr. Gordon said, but puts the treatment center in a kiosk at the shopping mall.  “We’re discovering we can get the same remarkable results that were shown in the Stanford study, but at costs ranging from $350 to $180 per patient, as opposed to several thousands using traditional methods.”