How heart-healthy is your cardiologist? Turns out they may not know, either.

Whenever I reflect on my adventures in Italy, I tend to remember how healthy everyone seemed to be.  Life was savoured and enjoyed.  Food was fresh, thoughtfully prepared, usually local, and full of flavour.  And everyone seemed active and in good shape.

I was surprised when I read the SOCRATES (Survey on Cardiac Risk Profile and Lifestyle Habits in a Cohort of Italian Cardiologists) study published late last fall.  Over 5000 cardiologists were contacted to complete a survey that evaluated their lifestyle habits, medication use, cardiovascular risk factors, and personal characteristics.

What did the investigators discover?  Almost 50% of the group was living with a major cardiovascular risk factor (e.g., diabetes, high cholesterol, hypertension) and almost 30% had two or more risk factors.  Only 22% were free of risk.

Interestingly, 90% of the cardiologists identified that they were living without major risk to their cardiac health.  Given that the majority of those studied identified as overweight/obese, sedentary, highly stressed, and did not take cardioprotective agents, the authors wondered to what degree to cardiologists have insight into their own heart-health.

Any cardiologists care to comment?  Is this a geographically-bound phenomena or are there other factors involved?