A heart attack also causes reactions in other organs

Also affected other organs: heart attack detected as a "systemic disease"
A heart attack is a dangerous event and can be fatal for those affected. Researchers from Austria have now shown that an infarct not only affects the heart but also the entire organism and also affects other organs.

Good cardiac surgery care in Germany
Every year around 300,000 people in Germany suffer a heart attack. In acute cases, rapid action is needed. Because a timely heart attack diagnosis saves lives. According to experts, heart surgery in Germany is generally very good. According to recent findings, a heart attack is a so-called "systemic disease", which is why future therapies should probably start in several places in the organism. The current acute therapy is not questioned by the new knowledge.

Researchers have shown that a heart attack is a so-called "systemic" disease that affects the entire organism and also causes other organs to react. (Image: Kzenon / fotolia.com)

Heart attack has consequences for the entire organism
An acute heart attack should not and should not be considered in isolation - myocardial infarction is a "systemic" disease that affects the entire organism and also causes other organs such as the liver and spleen to react.

This is the central finding of a study carried out by PhD student Matthias Zimmermann and under the direction of Hendrik Jan Ankersmit and Michael Mildner at the Clinical Department of Thoracic Surgery at the University Clinics for Surgery and Dermatology at MedUni Vienna.

The study results were recently published in the journal "Oncotarget".

Myocardial infarction in its entirety
"In doing so, we have stated that the tunnel vision, which focuses solely on the heart, must be reconsidered in the case of a heart attack," Zimmermann said, according to a statement. "Myocardial infarction is nothing isolated, the entire organism reacts with it."

Ankersmit added: "This was the first time in this descriptive science that we have been able to show what myocardial infarction looks like in its entirety. This contributes enormously to the systems biology understanding. "

So far, in standard science, attempts have mostly been made with monocausal approaches, without a holistic approach, to understand molecular and cellular processes after a heart attack (triggered by a circulatory disorder).

Also, little was known about the effects on tissues and other organs surrounding the infarct center.

Future therapy should be considered systemically
The current study was conducted in a large animal model relevant for humans. The researchers were able to show that thousands of genes are involved in a heart attack:

The heart attack thus changed the expression of almost 9,000 genes in the heart, but also of 900 in the liver and about 350 in the spleen tissue within 24 hours after infarction.

At the same time, the transcription factor Klf4 (a protein that is important for the activation of many other genes) could be attributed a significant role - this "large animal insight" could also be confirmed by histological studies on human autopsy material.

The central message of this work: "Myocardial ischemia, ie heart attack, does not end in the injured myocardium. Our results show that the spectrum of organs involved is much larger and there are many indications that a variety of organ systems are involved in coordinating an organism's response to the infarction. "

The new findings do not provide the common acute therapy in a heart attack in
Question - but open up the discussion of whether a future therapy should not be considered systemically and should begin in several places in the organism. (Ad)