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People Fixing The World

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Discover the people and the projects trying to make the world a better place

Discover the people and the projects trying to make the world a better place.

Discover the people and the projects trying to make the world a better place.

A weekly programme looking at common challenges around the world and the creative ways people are trying to tackle them.

Presenter Myra Anubi speaks to reporters, experts and innovators to investigate how effective different solutions are, share their successes and inspire listeners with what is possible.

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People Fixing The World: Shockwaves for the heart

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Shockwaves for the heart

19/09/2023 GMT

BBC World Service - People Fixing The World, Shockwaves for the heart

An Austrian surgeon has a radical new treatment for heart disease

An Austrian surgeon has a radical new treatment for heart disease.

Heart disease and other cardiovascular diseases are the biggest killer in the world, causing 18 million deaths globally every year. 

Cardiologists and heart surgeons try to manage heart disease with stents, surgery and drugs, but the organ itself does not heal. Finding a way to regenerate heart tissue has become a holy grail for medicine.
 
Now there is new hope from a strange and pioneering technique from Austria. Doctors there believe that applying shockwaves directly to the heart after surgery dramatically improves patient outcomes. 

The shockwaves – which are sonic pressure waves, rather than electric shocks – lead to new growth of blood vessels and trick the body’s immune system into action. 

The BBC’s global health correspondent Naomi Grimley travels to Innsbruck to see the treatment in action.

Presenter: Myra Anubi
Producer: William Kremer
Series producer: Tom Colls
Sound mix: Hal Haines and Gareth Jones
Editor: Penny Murphy

Email: peoplefixingtheworld@bbc.co.uk

Image: Heart surgery

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