I've had this movie on my watchlist for a while and just now got around to watching it, and boy am I glad that I did.This was really a fascinating and rich documentary. It is about medical industry technologies in relation to heart attacks and the developments that have been made the past 20 years, specifically a few types of technologies.Helpful technologies are suppressed, due to a mixture of ignorance, greed, and blind faith in old knowledge among those wielding the power of change in the medical community.Luckily over the years these new forms of heart attack prevention and treatments have been widely accepted and adopted, due to various occurrences which are described in the movie.At times the movie will present you with real 911 calls, to solidify the chilling reality of these sudden and deadly heart attacks that can change your life forever, or even worse, take it away.One peeve that I had with the movie was that it didn't go into details on what kind of nutrition would be helpful in preventing heart attacks. The food you consume and choose to fuel your body with definitely plays a large role in the occurrences, so it was a shame to not hear anything about it. I understand of course that the movie would like to focus on the story of these medical technologies, but still, they could have dedicated a few minutes to nutrition in my opinion. I saw another review here stating that the movie was highly opposed to sterns, but I did not get that impression at all. Rather I think it was being critical of the fact that a small amount of people were making incredibly large sums of money due to the invention and the operation of inserting them. The review I am referring to is actually incredibly suspect and strangely negative, which makes me think of one of the ignorant and misled persons interviewed in the movie. The author of that review actually created his/her account exactly 11 months ago when the review was written, and has not made any reviews since then... Not very surprising.

This documentary is a joke. The writer obviously has little to no medical knowledge and did not have competent advisors for this film. Even the title itself is inaccurate; the "widowmaker" is not the left anterior descending artery (LAD), it is the left main coronary artery. Not only that, the portion that describes stent placement first talks about blockages in the coronary artery, and then proceeds to say the stent is deployed in a vein. Really?!?! This is Cardiology 101 and they blew it.The documentary also utilizes fear mongering tactics with its anecdotes about individuals who had a heart attack or whose family member died from one. While tragic, these anecdotes mean nothing with regards to medical or scientific evidence. It is akin to someone having a bad experience at a restaurant and posting a terrible review online, when there are hundreds of customers who have an excellent experience. People like to focus on the negative – just watch the news.The most glaring problem is the direct comparison of coronary calcium scoring to stenting. This is like comparing apples to oranges. Calcium scoring is a screening tool that is used to determine risk factors and the possible need to diagnostic coronary angiography. It is not a therapeutic intervention! In fact, the documentary fails to even mention the role of diagnostic coronary angiography as a precursor to stenting. It would lead you to believe that unless you undergo calcium scoring, you will have a heart attack and be one of the millions who die each year from heart disease. If a person gets a "heart scan" and it shows a significant calcium burden, the patient will likely be referred for diagnostic coronary angiography. This is the definitive diagnostic test for coronary artery disease. No angiography = no stent. It's as simple as that.The part about lifestyle modification and optimal medical therapy and its superiority to stenting is also misleading. Medicine and a healthy lifestyle can slow the progression of existing disease and delay the onset of heart disease in many people, but again we are comparing apples to oranges. Stents are for severe, existing coronary lesions (blockages). They do not prevent heart disease. In fact, if someone has a stent that was not properly deployed or not on the proper medications after the stent, they are at an increased risk for a heart attack due to sub-acute thrombosis.I could go on about the problems with this documentary, but I think this gets the point across. This documentary is not an accurate picture of reality. It is heavily biased against stenting because the writer is ignorant of the facts and/or chose to omit important information.The parts about the development of calcium scoring and stents were interesting, however. That is about the only redeeming part.

Very eye opening and not to be missed! Gives you a good idea of what tests to ask for and who to see. The one thing I found weird was they showed all these really rich cardiologists who had extremely bad teeth. I have read where your teeth can have a big impact on heart health. I have had the scan already and will again. I recommend it everyone. Do not stick your head in the sand and become frightened at getting info that could save your life. I hope this message reaches a lot of people who need it. You can really see where decisions about our lives are made by doctors who are really asses and act like it's amusing! They say a stent is no more better than diet and exercise....when someone is laying on the table and gets a stent that opens his artery immediately. Like every thing else in life, money seems to be the big motivation in treatments getting the go ahead or not. Money and hubris . One or two people can influence a whole country as far as what tests will be paid for by insurance.

I'm sure this film is full of great advice to people about not ignoring heart symptoms,. getting regular check ups on your heart, etc. The thing is, the movie is inaccurate, right from the beginning.I am 37. I have ZERO heart disease. I have normal BP, HDL, LDL, and Triglycerides. I had a LAD (Widowmaker) heart attack one morning at work. It was NOT preventable. There was NOTHING I could have done to prevent it. "Totally and 100% preventable" is said more than 10 times in the first 5 minutes of this film, therefore, I turned it off (sadly) because it's not accurate.Again, I had a LAD (Widowmaker) Heart Attack at 37, and it WAS NOT preventable in any way.If you are a person aged 20-59, and have a heart, you are at risk for a heart attack.Get educated, and for God's sake, be more responsible with your words (to all the doctors making false statements in this film). Google SCAD Heart Attack, and get educated.