NWTHS Heart Hospital celebrates 20 years of serving the area

The Heart Hospital at Northwest Texas Healthcare System (NWTHS), celebrated its 20th anniversary on Thursday afternoon. Since its inception two decades ago, The Heart Hospital has been dedicated to fighting America’s No. 1 killer – heart disease. As a leader in cardiovascular care for the Texas Panhandle community, medical staff and professionals have been bringing the latest technology for patients with cardiovascular diseases.

“This is a milestone anniversary for the Heart Hospital. Here at NWTHS, we dedicated toward heart care, not only acute care for problems, but also preventative care, and we are trying to raise awareness in the community for preventive heart care with this here today,” Dr. Lane Cox, chief of cardiology at NWTHS, said.

The Heart Hospital serves the top 26 counties of the Texas Panhandle, as well as reaching and serving the area from Albuquerque, New Mexico, to Oklahoma City, Oklahoma, and further.

Over the past 20 years, the NWTHS Heart Hospital has served the community with prevention, diagnosis and treatment of cardiovascular disease, as well as advanced heart surgery, emergency heart and stroke care, and rehabilitation needs. For 2023-24, the NWTHS Heart Hospital was announced as a U.S. News & World Report High Performing Hospital for Heart Attack, Heart Failure and Stroke. The hospital has also received many other heart health accreditations since its inception.

“The Heart Hospital was built to meet the need of the community. Over the years, we have come to serve a lot more cardiovascular disease patients; it hasn’t decreased,” Martha Del Toro, marketing director for NWTHS said.

Cox said the importance of raising awareness – especially with the Texas Panhandle area having a higher percentage of heart disease due to the area’s higher obesity rates, type 2 diabetes, and tobacco use – is to help the community understand the risks and urge the community to remain involved in their healthcare.

“Know your numbers. Know what your blood pressure is; know what your cholesterol is. Know what your body mass index is. Those are something that you can control and do something about. If your cholesterol is high, you can take medications, same for blood pressure. If your BMI is high, you need to get that down and get into an exercise routine. From a cardiovascular standpoint, all we want is 30 minutes of sustained aerobic activity for at least three days a week,” Cox said.

Cox urges individuals facing acute cardiac problems to contact emergency services immediately. Cox says that it would be better for EMS to come out and find nothing than have an individual wait and it cause irreparable damage to the heart, which can lead to becoming a cardiac cripple.

Acute cardiac symptoms for men include chest pain and shortness of breath that becomes worse with exertion and relief with rest. For women, there is no one defining factor, but it can often include back pain.

For more information about the NWTHS heart hospital, visit them online at https://www.nwths.com/ .