Perceptions of Heart Failure in Japan
 

Greetings,

I have a question regarding how Heart Disease and death from Heart Attacks are perceived in Japanese culture.

I just finished watching a documentary titled “The Oiling of America.” In it, the lecturer makes a statement that in Japan, if a person dies from heart failure, it brings dishonor to the person's family, and so for that reason, many doctors sign off the cause of death as a stroke, instead of a heart attack.

I found this to be a rather odd statement, and am skeptical of its validity, but wanted to get some input from people who actually know something about Japanese culture.

Is there any basis to this claim?

For cancer, I have heard some cases in which the family of lost person hide the true cause of the death because the relatives could be regarded having the gene of cancer and could inherit the gene.

Heart failures can be regarded as the unfavorable gene but I have never heard about such cases.

It is not Japanese specific traditional culture. People in many other country would think in the same manner.