The World Health Organization (WHO) published on Wednesday a new pocket book aiming to help health workers identify people at risk of heart diseases and prescribe the most appropriate treatment for them.

The "Pocket Guidelines for Assessment and Management of Cardiovascular Risk" can be carried and used by any health care worker and is available in six languages, the UN agency said in a statement.

The guide contains easy-to-use charts that can predict the risk of a heart attack or a stroke and could help health workers to save and improve the lives of people in all countries, the statement said.

"This is a real breakthrough. Now, health care workers everywhere can use a simple assessment and treatment tool to prevent heart attacks and strokes," said WHO Director-General Margaret Chan.

"Primary health care workers now have a new tool to assess and manage people at risk of heart attacks and strokes. This brings cardiovascular care to the places and people who need it most," she added.

According to the WHO, this is the first cardiovascular disease risk-prediction system that can be used worldwide and is also specially designed for use with people everywhere, including in low-resource settings.

It is an important innovation that will help health workers to target limited health care resources at people who are at higher risk of developing heart attacks and strokes.

These guidelines will be available in six languages and they will be distributed to health workers in the form of pocket guides that have been produced for each of the WHO regions. The pocket guides are available in hard copy and on the WHO website.

To ensure that the pocket guide gets into the hands of the health care workers who should use it, the WHO will be collaborating with national Ministries of Health and health-focused Non-Governmental-Organizations to organize "training of trainers" workshops and distribution of the pocket guide.
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(Xinhua News Agency September 12, 2007)