ART AND SCIENCE IN CARDIOVASCULAR DISEASE

As the progress in technology and pharmaceutical domain resulted in effective solutions for transmissible diseases such as cholera or poliomyelitis which caused mil-lions of deaths worldwide in the past, the importance of cardiovascular disease was brought into the spotlight. Many lifesaving interventions such the percutaneous angio-plasties in acute myocardial infarction led to an important impact in the survival rates increasing longevity. Furthermore, the prevention of cardiovascular disease has proven to be both effective and cost-efficient. The 2016 “European Guidelines on Cardiovascular Disease Prevention in Clinical Practice” clearly states that stop-ping smoking is the most cost-effective strategy for cardiovascular disease preven-tion (1).