Heart Attack Causes

Heart Attack Causes

There are few different things that heart attack causes have in common. The primary one, however, is that all these causes put unnecessary strain and stress on the body and the heart. In order to limit your potential for a heart attack it is important to know what the causes are. If you know what causes a heart attack you can develop a plan to eliminate these causes from your life. It may be difficult to eliminate all of the heart attack causes from your life because there are factors at work that you have no control over, such as genetics. However, there are some causes that you can strive to minimize or even eliminate.

One of the most common heart attack causes is stress. If you are a constant worrier who doesn’t get much sleep then you are at a greater risk of having a heart attack. When you are stressed out your body goes into overdrive. This puts unnecessary strain on the heart muscle. Over time, this constant strain on the heart will gradually weaken it. In turn, you may have a heart attack. Good ways to deal with stress include doing something that you enjoy that also has a benefit for the heart. This could include things such as taking a long walk or jumping in the pool to go for a swim. The idea is to take your mind off of what is stressing so that your heart can get a workout in a good way.

Obesity is also one of the major heart attack causes. Becoming obese is directly related to your diet in most cases. If you are putting bad foods into your body you will likely see your weight climb. When this happens you are putting extra pressure on your heart. Your heart must work faster and harder in an effort to carry all of the excess weight around. A poor diet will also contribute to plaque buildup in your arteries. If you have substantial buildup in your arteries then eventually it will stop the blood flow to your heart. Once this happens you will have a heart attack.

Heart attack causes are often things that can be avoided if you decide to take care of yourself both mentally and physically. Making an effort to live more of a stress free lifestyle while also eating healthier can reduce your risk of a heart attack in no time flat.

Heart Attack Symptoms in Women

Heart Attack Symptoms in Women

In some cases the heart attack symptoms in women can be different from the symptoms that occur in men. At the end of the day, whether you are a man or a woman, it is important to recognize these symptoms and do all that you can in an effort to receive medical attention. The biggest factor to surviving a heart attack is to identify what the potential symptoms are and to get to the hospital immediately. A mistake that many women make is that they do not seek out medical help fast enough. Women must know what they are at risk for, recognize it if they feel the symptoms and get in front of a doctor as soon as possible.

Uncomfortable pressure in the chest is reported by about half of women who have suffered a heart attack. The pressure can feel like a heaviness or squeezing sensation in, or near, the area where the heart is located. In some cases, women have reported that the pain and discomfort has spread to the left arm.

One of the big heart attack symptoms in women is a feeling of pain around the upper stomach area. It is important to note that this pain can be related to the heart and not just a bout of indigestion or acid reflux. Some women have self diagnosed this pain improperly and have treated it by using antacids with no luck. If you are experiencing an unusual amount of pain in this area then there is a chance that you are having a heart attack. Pain in the upper stomach area can act as a precursor to other symptoms. If you wait until you feel the other symptoms of a heart attack, such as chest pain, it may be too late. That is why it is important to get in front of a doctor at the first sign of a heart attack.

Women are at risk of having a heart attack just like men are. Things such as stress and obesity can trigger a heart attack in the blink of an eye. If you are having unusual feelings of fatigue, trouble sleeping or spells of dizziness then you may be a candidate for a heart attack in the near future. If some of these early warning signs come up then you can take action in order to prevent yourself from having a heart attack. Heart attack symptoms in women should be something that each woman is aware of. Knowing the symptoms can be the difference between life and death.

Heart Disease in Women

Heart Disease in Women

Heart disease in women is a serious issue that needs special attention. Certain factors that pertain only to women are responsible for making this group of people at risk. In the past, most physicians would typically monitor men more closely for heart disease than women. This is because, in general, it was thought that most women have a lifestyle that is less stressful than men. While this may have been true at some point in time, it is not true today. The fact that many women deal with the same stresses as men, coupled with the fact that there are a few natural causes for heart disease in women in play, means that special attention must be paid to the possibility of heart disease.

Causes of Heart Disease in Women

* Menopause. Some medical professionals feel that when a women’s body stops producing estrogen they are at greater risk for getting heart disease. There is evidence that suggests that estrogen helps to insulate a women’s body from acquiring the condition. This fact is especially true if menopause occurs due to surgery. If a women has surgery to remove the ovaries or the uterus then the chances of them getting heart disease increases significantly.

* Birth Control Pills. Women who take birth control pills put themselves at risk of getting heart disease. In an effort to protect yourself from this condition is recommended that the pills be low-dose. The lower dose will be gentler on the body, specifically the heart. With that in mind, women who are on birth control and smoke cigarettes or have high blood pressure are at a higher risk for heart disease.

* Poor lifestyle habits. Similar to men, women who are in the habit of not exercising and eating poorly are at a greater risk for getting heart disease. A lack of exercise will oftentimes be accompanied by high cholesterol. If you have high cholesterol than the chance of having a narrowing or hardening of the arteries improves. Also, eating a poor diet will mean that you are putting food into your body that can poison it. In short, fatty foods will lead to the production of plaque in the arteries which will ultimately begin to build up on the interior walls of the arteries.

Heart disease in women is a major problem in this day and age. Knowing the causes and symptoms can help you identify if there are any warning signs present.

What Causes Heart Attacks and Heart Failure

Causes of Heart Attacks

We have all heard of heart attacks, this article sheds light on what causes heart attacks. A heart attack has many causes: however one occurs due to lack of oxygen rich blood in the heart coronary arteries are the blood vessels which supply the heart with oxygen and blood, blockage of coronary arteries causes injury to heart muscle.
So what causes heart attacks ?


Atherosclerosis

This is usually a gradual process in which plaques or collections of cholesterol get deposited around artery walls. These plaques harden the artery walls, narrowing the lumen which is the inner channel of the artery. In many people, atherosclerosis can go unnoticed for years, in some cases beginning even from teenage years. The symptoms and health problems do not occur until later on in life when the narrowing of the artery becomes severe. High blood pressure, high cholesterol, cigarette smoking and diabetes are just some of the things which accelerate atherosclerosis, especially in people with a family history of heart attacks.

Artery Spasm

An artery spasm is caused by constrictions of arteries which prevent oxygen rich blood from reaching the heart. The spasms are often caused by blood clots, fatty acid build ups on the artery wall and blood clots caused by plaque. Though spasms, don’t cause heart attacks each time the artery is affected but an artery spasm can cause permanent heart damage.

Drug Use

Drugs which speed up the cardiovascular system have been known to induce heart attacks. Cocaine usage on a regular basis can cause heart attacks due to the high dosage used to achieve the high. methamphetamine's have also been known to cause heart failure.

Causes of Heart Failure

Heart failure usually occurs after other conditions have weakened and damaged the heart. Over time the heart becomes too weak to perform its duty of pumping blood to the body. The ventricles which are the heart’s pumping chambers become stiff and are unable to properly fill in between the beats. The heart muscle weakens to the point that it cannot pump blood effectively throughout the body. Heart failure begins on the left ventricle. Signs of heart failure include: fatigue, chronic coughing, a rapid/ irregular heartbeat, shortness of breath amongst other symptoms.

Heart disease is a term used to cover conditions such as coronary artery disease, congestive heart failure, cardiac arrest, congenital heart diseases and heart attack.The survival rate of cardiac arrest outside hospital is less than 2%. It takes only four to six minutes after a cardiac arrest for a person to experience brain death followed by loss of life.Most heart attacks occur in the morning. Reason being the stress hormones is higher and blood is usually thicker hence harder to pump as one is partially dehydrated.
Heart disease risk factors

Most heart disease risk factors are controllable with simple lifestyle changes. Some of these include: Smoking, unhealthy diets, stress, physical fitness as well as high blood cholesterol and triglyceride levels which is a type of fat found in blood. Uncontrollable risk factors include: a family history of heart disease, age and gender.
Heart problems if left untreated can lead to death.

Having known what causes heart attacks, it is important to consult a doctor in case of any of the above signs.

What causes heart attacks? Myocardial Infractions Explained

Heart attack

Heart attack, or myocardial infarction as they are commonly referred to by doctors, occur when blood flow to a part of the heart that  is blocked for an extended period of time leading to the damage or death of tissues in that area which can lead to the heart muscles getting damaged and dying. And that is what causes heart attacks.

The main cause of heart attacks is the blockage of the coronary arteries that deliver blood to the heart. This blockage is caused mainly by the buildup of a substance called plaque which is mainly made up of cholesterol and other cells along the walls of the arteries stopping the flow of blood to the muscles starving them of oxygen and causing them to die. The actual causes of heart attacks are not well known, but they can be triggered by heavy physical activity, being active outside in the cold weather or by severe emotional and physical stress.

Causes of heart failure:

One contributing factor for heart attacks is coronary heart disease. This is governed by your heart disease risk factor. These are habits or conditions that increase your risk of getting coronary heart disease and these factors also increase the risk of coronary heart disease worsening.

The main heart disease risk factors are high blood cholesterol, high blood pressure, obesity, diabetes, smoking, unhealthy diet and lack of physical activity. Any one of or any combination of these factors greatly increases your likelihood of getting coronary heart disease.

Heart problems are another factor that causes heart attacks. These are related to cardiac heart disease. The main one is the clogging of the coronary arteries due to the buildup of plaque.

Heart failure is when the heart stops functioning properly leading to the heart attack. It’s caused when blood flow is restricted to the cardiac muscles; this means the muscles are deprived of oxygen which they need to function. The muscles gradually stop working and may die, this means that the heart can’t pump blood properly and hence causing heart failure.

Heart failure is normally preceded by certain signs that if spotted in time, can be vital in preventing a heart attack. The most common signs are shortness of breath, coughing or wheezing, tightness around the chest, and buildup of fluids in body tissues, dizziness, nausea, fatigue and anxiety. These signs once seen should be acted upon immediately to avert any impending heart attack.

what causes heart attacks

Here are some facts about heart attacks that show how major an issue it is;

In the US in 2008, heart attacks accounted for 616000 deaths, almost 25% of the deaths, making it the leading killer in the US. It accounts for 25.1% of the deaths in whites making it the leading cause of death among white adults and is estimated to cost the US government $108.9 billion in treatment, medication and lost productivity.

Having answered the question what causes heart attacks with these causes and signs of an impending heart attack, one sees the need to change their lifestyle to lower their risk of heart attack and live a healthy productive life.

Symptoms of Heart Disease

Symptoms of Heart Disease

No single can be branded as Symptoms of Heart Disease. Then it no one single reason that indicates a heart disorder. There are certain symptoms that suggest the possibility of heart disease. Together they make the diagnosis almost certain. Doctors identify Symptoms of Heart Disease by interviewing the person to obtain the medical history and by performing a physical examination. Often, diagnostic procedures are performed to confirm the result of the diagnosis. However, sometimes a heart disorder, even when serious, produces no symptoms until it reaches a late stage. Routine health checkups or a visit to the doctor for some other reason may uncover a heart disorder that has caused no Symptoms of Heart Disease, earlier. Sometimes doctors perform procedures to screen for a heart disorder even when there is no evidence of it.

The Symptoms of Heart Disease include certain types of pain, shortness of breath, fatigue, palpitation or irregular heartbeats, light-headedness, fainting, and swelling in the legs, ankles, and feet. However, these symptoms do not necessarily indicate a heart disorder. For example, chest pain may be due to a respiratory or digestive disorder rather than to a heart disorder. But as soon as you experience any of the above mentioned complains you must consult your doctor for confirmation. Peripheral Symptoms of Heart Disease and blood vessel disorders vary depending on where the affected blood vessels are located. These symptoms may include pain, muscle fatigue, muscle cramps, light-headedness, swelling, numbness, shortness of breath, and a change in skin color of the affected part of the body.

Chest pain is the most prominent Symptoms of Heart Disease. Immediately life-threatening causes include a heart attack, separation of the layers of the aorta's wall, that is known as aortic dissection, rupture of the esophagus, a blood clot in the lungs, and a type of collapsed lung in which pressure builds up enough to obstruct blood flow returning to the heart. Pain may occur when tissues do not get enough blood, this condition is called ischemia. Pain occurs because the tissues do not get enough oxygen that is carried to tissues by the blood, and also because waste products, which are carried away from tissues by the blood, accumulate. Other Symptoms of Heart Diseases are: Discomfort, pressure, heaviness, or pain in the chest, arm or below the breastbone, Discomfort radiating to the back, throat, jaw or arm, Extreme weakness, anxiety or shortness of breath, Rapid or irregular heartbeats, Fullness, indigestion or choking feeling, he may also feel heartburn, Sweating, vomiting, nausea, or dizziness.

During a heart attack, symptoms last for 30 minutes or longer and are not relieved by rest or oral medications. Initial symptoms started as a mild discomfort that then it progresses to significant pain. Swelling is due to the accumulation of fluid in tissues. Swelling is another important Symptoms of Heart Disease. It occurs when blood puddles in the leg veins, increasing pressure in the leg veins and forcing fluids out of the veins into tissues.

Cardiac Arrhythmia

Cardiac Arrhythmia

Cardiac arrhythmia is caused by conditions where in the heart, the electric activity is irregular, faster or slower than the normal activity. The normal activity of the heart is highly hampered by this condition. Cardiac arrhythmia can cause heart attacks and sudden deaths. In extreme cases there is variations in the heart beats. Some cardiac arrhythmia can cause missing of heartbeats and tachycardia. However these symptoms are nothing about which one should be alarmed. In cardiac arrhythmia, people can experience sinus arrhythmia that is mild acceleration along with normal rhythm of the heart movements occurring by breathing normally. The normal resting of the heart beats ranges from 60 to 100 beats per minute in an adult. The heart beats are controlled by sinoatrial node or sinus node that is an area in the upper chamber of the human heart. The specialized cells contains spontaneous electrical activity which starts the normal heart beats in an individual.

In cardiac arrhythmia, tachycardia is when the heart beats faster than the rate of of 100 beats per minute. However the age of an individual is very important in determining this factor. For instance, a younger individual has a faster heart beat compared to older individuals. The sinus node inside the heart has an increased rate of activity when an individual is exercising or doing something that requires exertion of physical activities. The development of faster activities of the sinus nodes are known as sinus tachycardia. When the activity reaches to extreme levels then cardiac arrhythmia occurs. In cardiac arrhythmia, the ventricles of the heart experiences such tachycardia for a longer time and then causes the reaction. The palpitations felt under such conditions are tachycardia.

Tachycardia in cardiac arrhythmia can cause lowering of the blood pressures. This in turn leads to dizziness, fainting or lightheaded sensations. When tachycardia is rapid, the pumping function of the heart is hampered. In extreme cases, tachycardia lead to sudden death. However most of the tachycardia suffered by an individual is not very harmful. The rise in adrenaline too causes tachycardia. The cause of tachycardia can be stress or induced substances like intake of caffeine, alcohol and amphetamines. People suffering from overactive thyroid gland (hyperthyroidism) too suffer from tachycardia in cardiac arrhythmia.

People suffering from cardiac arrhythmia should restrict from the agents or activities that cause tachycardia. While the fast movements are called tachycardia, the slow beating of the hearts are known as bradycardia. In this type of cardiac arrhythmia, the heart beats less than 60 beats per hour. The causes of bradycardia are supply of low oxygen, blockage in the heart and electrolyte abnormalities. A pacemaker is required when this condition causes symptoms implantation. In both tachycardia and bradycardia, medical attention needs to be paid. Another form of cardiac arrhythmia is known as fibrillation. In this condition, there is quivering motion inside the heart muscle because of disunity in contractile cell function. There are two types of fibrillation like atrial fibrillation in the atrium and ventricular fibrillation in the ventricles. The ventricular fibrillation is more life threatening than atrial fibrillation.

Heart Disease in Women

Heart Disease in Women

Heart disease in women is a serious issue that needs special attention. Certain factors that pertain only to women are responsible for making this group of people at risk. In the past, most physicians would typically monitor men more closely for heart disease than women. This is because, in general, it was thought that most women have a lifestyle that is less stressful than men. While this may have been true at some point in time, it is not true today. The fact that many women deal with the same stresses as men, coupled with the fact that there are a few natural causes for heart disease in women in play, means that special attention must be paid to the possibility of heart disease.











Causes of Heart Disease in Women

* Menopause. Some medical professionals feel that when a women’s body stops producing estrogen they are at greater risk for getting heart disease. There is evidence that suggests that estrogen helps to insulate a women’s body from acquiring the condition. This fact is especially true if menopause occurs due to surgery. If a women has surgery to remove the ovaries or the uterus then the chances of them getting heart disease increases significantly.

* Birth Control Pills. Women who take birth control pills put themselves at risk of getting heart disease. In an effort to protect yourself from this condition is recommended that the pills be low-dose. The lower dose will be gentler on the body, specifically the heart. With that in mind, women who are on birth control and smoke cigarettes or have high blood pressure are at a higher risk for heart disease.

* Poor lifestyle habits. Similar to men, women who are in the habit of not exercising and eating poorly are at a greater risk for getting heart disease. A lack of exercise will oftentimes be accompanied by high cholesterol. If you have high cholesterol than the chance of having a narrowing or hardening of the arteries improves. Also, eating a poor diet will mean that you are putting food into your body that can poison it. In short, fatty foods will lead to the production of plaque in the arteries which will ultimately begin to build up on the interior walls of the arteries.

Heart disease in women is a major problem in this day and age. Knowing the causes and symptoms can help you identify if there are any warning signs present.