Pain in heart angina
A lot of diseases have chest pain as a symptom. It is your doctor's duty to make the difference and say what exactly causes your discomfort and to prescribe you a treatment. However, it is good for patients also to know what can cause pain in the cardiac area and what can they expect. First, I would like to enumerate the conditions that have the heart pain as a symptom:
- Cardiac Arrhythmias
- Angina pectoris
- Myocardial Infarction (Heart attack)
- Congenital heart disease (inborn heart defects)
- Aortic valve regurgitation
- Rheumatic valve stenosis
- Cardiomyopathies
- Hypertension
The most frequent mistake that doctors make when they meet a patient with heart pains, is that they ask: "Do you have heart pains?". Instead, they should ask if you have any type of pain or discomfort in the heart area or around it, in the left hand, jaw or shoulder. This would be more relevant and will make you talk more about the discomfort you experience. Also, if you have a meeting with your doctor and feel like he or she hasn't asked you all about your symptoms, you can mention them without being asked.
Why does the heart pain occur?
The mechanism of heart pain is complex, but usually the pain is a sign that the heart myocardium (heart muscle) is suffering due to the coronary atherosclerosis, in other words, too tight heart arteries. Remember a day after an intense jogging, when your legs' muscles are painful and you can't even move. The same mechanism happens in the heart - without enough oxygen, the muscles accumulate lactic acid and other toxic factors which stimulate the pain receptors and we feel a sharp acute pain. The larger the area affected by the lack of oxygen, the bigger will be the intoxication of the muscle and the bigger the pain.
Further, I'd like to talk about the heart pains in angina pectoris, as this is the most frequent condition that causes heart pains and needs medical advice as soon as possible.
The heart pain in the angina pectoris
The pain in angina can be characterized in simple words as an unpleasant sensation in the chest. Some may say it is the same discomfort as in an indigestion, heartburn, tightness, squeezing, pressure. The angina pain in elderly persons or in diabetics may be different and not so sharp or precisely located. They might complain on shortness of breath rather than pain in the heart. Some people may refer to their angina pains as either an "awful pain" ("like a car motor on my chest"), while, on the other hand, in some cases the pain can be unnoticeable and put the physician in doubt whether or not his patient suffers an angina pectoris.
As you can see, the heart pain in angina can vary very much from case to case. It depends on the age, other concomitant diseases, pain tolerance, etc. It is good to remember that heart pains in angina are usually retrosternal, behind the breastbone. If you would be asked to draw a circle around the area where you feel the pain, and you make a circle that is mainly orientate to breastbone, than there are big chances you're suffering an angina pectoris.
You might be interested in:
- False heart attack - disease that may mimic a myocardial infarction
- The pain in heart attack - location, irradiation and common signs
- Signs of a Heart Attack
- Nature of the pain in Heart Attack
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