Heart disease begins long before diagnosis is given

I will never forget the time when my son Spencer was five years old and I told him that I was going to work to take care of people’s hearts. His response—only a five-year-old could have put it so simply—was, “Why can’t the people take care of their own hearts?” As much as it made me laugh then, in the seven years since that time, I have not stopped thinking about it.

Why can’t people take care of t…