Heart attack does not always come with pain

Heart attack: Pain does not always radiate into the arm

07/23/2014

In Germany, more and more interventions are performed on attacked coronary vessels, although there are not necessarily more patients than before. But heart disease usually recognized late, is fact. An expert explains how sufferers can better allocate pain.

Heart attack pain does not always radiate into the left arm
Often, coronary heart disease (CHD) first becomes apparent when it is almost too late: one of the typical consequences of constricted coronary arteries is an acute myocardial infarction due to vascular occlusion. Signs that indicate chest pain are in the midst of the chest around the sternum, radiating into the upper body. According to a message from the news agency dpa, she describes Professor Dietrich Andresen of the German Heart Foundation as „planar, oppressive and burning“ and associated with a tightness in the chest. However, the assumption that pain in a heart attack always radiates to the left arm is wrong. „That can but does not have to be“, so the cardiology of the Evangelical Elisabeth Clinic Berlin.

Many are unaware of heart attack warnings
Heart attack patients would often have sweats, upper abdominal pain and sweating and suffer from nausea and vomiting. If the signs of an infarction are noticed, the emergency doctor should be called immediately, because there is danger to life. Many people are unaware of heart attack or stroke warnings. Among other things, this had resulted in a representative survey of the Max Planck Institute for Educational Research in collaboration with the Gesellschaft für Konsumforschung (GfK) last year. As the managing director of the Max Planck Institute for Educational Research, Gerd Gigerenzer, informed at the time, he was astonished that „Even people with hypertension or obesity who are at an increased risk of heart attack or stroke, only a little better informed“ are, as the average of the population.

Stay for about six hours
In an acute myocardial infarction, a coronary vessel is blocked, the associated heart muscle is no longer sufficiently supplied with nutrients and dies in places. Andresen explained: „The larger the affected vessel, the greater the damage to the heart.“ About six hours would be left to make the clogged vessel pervious again, for example by using a stent. However, it is no longer enough for the patient to survive when more than 40 percent of the heart muscle has died.

Angina can be felt during physical exertion
A second form of coronary heart disease can be felt by those under physical strain. „In angina pectoris, the coronary arteries constrict more and more, but are still open“, explained Andresen. If the patient does not move, the blood flow is sufficient to feed the heart muscle. But as soon as he climbs a staircase, for example, the muscle needs more blood and the constricted blood vessels can not deliver that to him. This manifests itself in the form of pain. „They are characteristically like a heart attack, but not necessarily the preform of a heart attack.“ According to experts, the symptoms are often felt as "heartburn." If the affected person stops, the pain disappears again, but due to angina pectoris, it can eventually lead to a heart attack. ".

Vessels stiffen due to deposits
"The human heart is a hollow muscle that is fed with its own blood system. "From the main artery of the body, the aorta, vessels reach into the heart muscle, called coronary vessels, which are initially elastic but they can become stiffened and hardened by deposits such as cholesterol, and then, when blood pressure rises, they can rupture and platelets collect at the damaged site to quench the resulting bleeding and, in the worst case, clog the vessel - causing a heart attack. ad)