Cardiovascular Disease

Last update: 1 October 2009,
by Maureen Bell

I've divided this page into two sections. The first provides you with some tips on searching for material on Medline, and the second provides links to other Australian and overseas web resources, including some full text report and journal literature.

Searching Medline

Remember that Medline has a Thesaurus of terms - MeSH (Medical Subject Headings), a controlled vocabulary used for indexing articles in Medline. MeSH terminology provides a consistent way to retrieve information where authors may use different terminology for the same concepts.

You will find material on this subject in Medline, but you will need to be aware of the thesaurus (MeSH) terms used to search for the various topics. The term cardiovascular disease has an extensive number of more specific terms associated with it, and you can see these listed in the MeSH database.

MeSH - Cardiovascular Diseases

Many topics in MeSH have hierarchies of more specific subcategories or related terms. The indentations in the lists reflect the structure of the hierarchy, and the + signs at the end of terms indicate that there is a further hierarchy of terms not displayed here. Any of these terms can be searched individually, or you can "explode" terms to search sections of the list.

When you search for subjects using MeSH terms from the Medline thesaurus you will also have the option of appending subheadings to narrow the focus of your search.

For a list of the abbreviations used for subheadings in PubMed click here

Try the following search strategy to find articles on the relationship between cardiovascular disease and life style.

COMBINE

Cardiovascular Diseases (MeSH term)

AND

Life Style (MeSH term)
Typical way of life or manner of living characteristic of an individual or group. (From APA, Thesaurus of Psychogical Index Terms, 8th ed)

PubMed's default setting is to "explode" all terms, and so this search will include Life Change Events, which is a subcategory of Life Style. It will also include all of the subcategories of Cardiovascular Diseases listed above.

PubMed Search Formulation

This search strategy uses the headings cardiovascular diseases and life style. The section in the square brackets includes majr - which focuses the search on articles where the subject is a major issue in the article. The search is then limited to articles in English or with an English abstract.

Click here to see how it works. PubMed Search.

Australian Sources

Cardiovascular Disease in Australia (AIHW)
From Australian Institute of Health and Welfare. Through the links on the left you can access general information on the impact of cardiovascular disease in Australia, its major risk factors, information on cardiovascular procedures and statistics. Click here for links to publications on cardiovascular disease.

Cardiovascular Health Publication list (AIHW)

Health Report - Heart Disease
Health Report - Stroke and Blood Pressure
Transcripts from Radio National's Health Report, with Norman Swan.

Heart Foundation Professional Information
Resources from the Heart Foundation, including cardiovascular disease statistics.

National Health Priority Area: Cardiovascular Health
From the Australian Institute for Health and Welfare. Links to publications are available on this page.

Overseas Sources

British Heart Foundation Statistics Website
The British Heart Foundation's statistics website is a comprehensive and up-to-date source of statistics on the burden, prevention, treatment and causes of heart disease in the UK.

Cardiovascular Center --- HealthandAge
Resources from the Novartis Foundation for Gerontology.

Cardiovascular Disease - Public Health Agency of Canada
Full text of a number of publications from the Public Health Agencyof Canada.

Cardiovascular Diseases
The World Health Organisation's cardiovascular disease web page.

DHDSP - Heart Disease
DHDSP - Stroke
DHDS Heart Disease and Stroke Maps
From the Division for Heart Disease and Stroke Prevention Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in the United States, resources on cardiovascular diseases.

Cochrane Reviews - by topic 'Heart'
From the Cochrane Library.

Control of Cardiovascular Diseases in Developing Countries: Research, Development, and Institutional Strengthening
Christopher P. Howson, K. Srinath Reddy, Thomas J. Ryan, and Judith R. Bale, Editors; Committee on Research, Development, and Institutional Strengthening for Control of Cardiovascular Diseases in Developing Countries, Institute of Medicine. Washington D.C., National Academy Press, 1998.

Framingham Heart Study
From the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute in the United States. The objective of the Framingham Heart Study was to identify the common factors or characteristics that contribute to CVD by following its development over a long period of time in a large group of participants who had not yet developed overt symptoms of CVD or suffered a heart attack or stroke. Since 1948, the subjects have continued to return to the study every two years for a detailed medical history, physical examination, and laboratory tests, and in 1971, the study enrolled a second-generation group -- 5,124 of the original participants' adult children and their spouses -- to participate in similar examinations.

Global Cardiovascular Infobase
From the WHO Collaborating Centre for Surveliiance of Cardiovascular Diseases.

Health Survey for England - Cardiovascular Disease
Vol. 1 Findings
Vol. 2 Methodology and Documentation
The Stationery Office, 1998.

Heart and Vascular Disease Information for Patients and the Public, NHLBI
Information on a variety of topics from the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute in the United States. The page has a link to Heart and Vascular Disease Information for Health Professionals.

MEDLINEplus: Circulatory Disorders
MEDLINEplus is the National Library of Medicine's consumer health information portal. Lists of links are evaluated/reviewed/quality-filtered.

MEDLINEplus: Heart Diseases (General)
MEDLINEplus is the National Library of Medicine's consumer health information portal. Lists of links are evaluated/reviewed/quality-filtered.

NHS Evidence - Cardiovascular
NHS Evidence - cardiovascular aims to provide high quality, evidence-based information on all of the aspects of cardiovascular diseases. This site is aimed at health professionals with an interest in cardiovascular diseases.

Statistics (American Heart Association)
Heart disease and stroke statistics.

Third Report of the Expert Panel on Detection, Evaluation, and Treatment of High Blood Cholesterol in Adults (Adult Treatment Panel III)
This is the Final Report of the National Expert Panel on Detection, Evaluation, and Treatment of High Blood Cholesterol in Adults (Adult Treatment Panel III) NIH Publication No. 02-5215, September 2002.