GCSE Biology, Unit 2, Lesson 5 of 8

Heart disease, risk factors and cancer

GCSE Biology, Organisation: tissues, organs, digestion and circulation, 25 minutes

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Coronary heart disease and its treatments, risk factors and what data can and cannot show, and benign and malignant tumours.

What you will learn

  • Explain coronary heart disease and evaluate stents, statins and other treatments
  • Use data to compare risk between groups
  • Tell correlation from causation
  • Describe benign and malignant tumours and risk factors for cancer

Coronary heart disease

A non-communicable disease cannot be passed from one person to another; a communicable disease can be caught.

Coronary heart disease is non-communicable. Fatty material builds up inside the coronary arteries, narrowing them. Less blood reaches the heart muscle, which gets too little oxygen; a blocked artery can cause a heart attack.

  • Stent: a mesh tube that holds the artery open. Works straight away; a small procedure with risks (clot, infection) and the artery can narrow again.
  • Statins: lower blood cholesterol, slowing the build-up. No operation, but taken every day for years, slow to act, possible side effects. Treatments like this are tested in trials against a placebo (a dummy pill), so any extra effect is down to the drug; in a double-blind trial neither the patients nor the doctors know who has which.
  • Faulty valves can be replaced (mechanical: lasts, but anti-clotting drugs for life; biological: no such drugs, but wears out). A transplant needs a donor and drugs against rejection; an artificial heart keeps someone alive while they wait.

"Evaluate" means both sides of each treatment and a conclusion for this patient.

The rest of this lesson and its 11 practice questions are locked.

In this lesson

  1. Coronary heart disease
  2. Risk factors and evidence
  3. Cancer
  4. Try it: Risk from a table

11 practice questions, marked as you go; about 25 minutes in all.

Key terms

Non-communicable, Communicable, Coronary arteries, Placebo, Double-blind trial, Valves, Transplant, Artificial heart, Risk factor, Correlation

In this unit: Organisation: tissues, organs, digestion and circulation

Levels of organisation, digestion and enzymes with the amylase and food test practicals, the heart, blood and lungs, heart disease and cancer, and transport in plants.

All of Organisation: tissues, organs, digestion and circulation

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