The problem of diagnosing cardiovascular diseases for modern medicine is very acute. Every year, such diseases take hundreds of thousands of lives all over the planet. If you identify the pathology on time and take measures to eliminate it or correct it, the risks to humans will be significantly lower. What methods and approaches are used to assess a person’s condition, if it can be assumed that the heart and blood vessels are unhealthy? We will analyze in general terms.
general information
If there is reason to believe that a person’s heart is unhealthy or there are problems with the vascular system, a comprehensive diagnosis of cardiovascular diseases is necessary. Such a measure will help prevent a sudden stroke, heart attack or aneurysm, timely identify the diagnosis and recommend a treatment program to the patient. Even if a person refuses a therapeutic course, he will be aware of the dangers facing him and how to change his position.
It is necessary to go through all the diagnostic measures recommended by the doctor if the listed pathologies have already been experienced, if you are concerned about high blood pressure. Diagnosis is needed to determine and select therapy for heart failure, cardiac arrhythmias, conduction, and contractility failures. In recent years, angina pectoris, vein disease, limb arteries are increasingly being detected. In order to identify them in time, it is necessary to resort to effective diagnostic approaches.
Relevance of the issue
To understand why the development of new, more effective approaches to the diagnosis of cardiovascular diseases is so important for physicians, you should first consider what these organs are, how important they are for human life, and how dangerous the diseases that affect them. The heart and blood vessels are a complex of organs responsible for the flow of blood in the body. With this fluid, oxygen molecules and nutrients, trace elements essential for the life of cellular structures are transported through the body. High-quality blood flow allows you to evenly distribute beneficial compounds in the internal systems. Only in this case can a person be healthy. If cardiac functionality is impaired, pathologies arise that adversely affect the vascular system, severe pathological conditions can form that reduce the quality of life or are associated with a risk of death.
It can be assumed that it is necessary to visit a doctor for a detailed diagnosis of cardiovascular diseases, if you are concerned about shortness of breath or soreness, localized near the heart. Typical symptoms of pathologies of this system include a frequent pulse, high blood pressure. Timely identification of the diagnosis, followed by the selection of adequate treatment is the best way to eliminate dangerous complications.
What is available to doctors?
Instrumental and laboratory diagnostics are distinguished for diseases of the cardiovascular system. An electrocardiogram belongs to the first category. For short, the study is called ECG. Such an event is basic and primary in cases of suspected heart disease or vascular lesion. A patient with the symptoms described above is immediately sent to an electrocardiogram. The study is supposed even in the case when there are no specific phenomena, but a preventive examination allows you to suspect an unhealthy heart. Sometimes an event is prescribed if the patient turned to doctors because of an illness unrelated to the heart, but the doctor believes that it could affect the functioning of a vital organ.
An ECG gives doctors a detailed picture of the heart rate and the regularity of such events. Based on the results, arrhythmia is determined, how much blood enters the heart muscle, whether these volumes are sufficient to ensure its normal performance.
Monitoring
Some time ago, the scientist Holter proposed a research technique that soon proved to be one of the most effective and giving an accurate idea of the patient's condition. This is an instrumental diagnosis of cardiovascular diseases, requiring continuous monitoring of the activity of the heart muscle. The event lasts at least 24 hours. Sometimes the patient is prescribed a three-day continuous check. This method allows you to deeply analyze the condition of a person. If coronary disease occurs, all its episodes are recorded. With arrhythmia, observation allows you to clarify the nuances of the course.
A study using Holter technology involves applying electrodes to the chest of a needy person. They are fixed to a special small apparatus, which the patient wears on his belt for the entire period of the study. The unit is fastened with a small belt. Sometimes attached to the shoulder. This method of diagnosing diseases of the cardiovascular system gives an accurate idea of all changes during the studied time period. Whatever the processes occurring in the heart muscle, the aggregate will fix everything that happens. The entire duration of the patient's procedure is required to keep a diary of action. It records what is happening. The task of the doctor is to compare the results issued by the equipment and the diary of the patient. Based on them, cardiac activity and ability to resist stress are evaluated.
Pressure: continuous monitoring
Another modern method for diagnosing cardiovascular diseases is checking blood pressure readings in the arterial bed during the day. The event involves an analysis of the state of the circulatory system. According to the results, the doctor has an accurate idea of the variability of pressure parameters. The dependence of changes on the usual daily activity of a person is revealed. The need for such a study was established by revealing that a one-time verification of indicators does not provide a qualitative idea of the vascular performance. Objective conclusions and an accurate diagnosis are possible only when the doctor knows how the pressure changes, how much it depends on the time of day, the patient’s activity, and any actions he performs.
For the entire period of the examination, a special cuff connected to the tonometer is attached to the patient’s arm. The unit is automatically activated with half-hour pauses, checks the data and writes the results to memory. Daily totals give 48 pairs of numbers. Such indicators are removed not only during wakefulness, but also when the person under investigation is sleeping.
Treadmill Test
Diagnosis of cardiovascular diseases in children and adults is possible through this effective and reliable method. The doctor uses special devices to obtain a cardiogram at a time when a person is physically active. The patient is given a special load, precisely calibrated taking into account his condition. Usually they use a treadmill, along which the patient steps steadily. The results of the study give an idea of the body's ability to withstand physical stress. The treadmill test reflects how the heart and blood vessels change their activity during a load of a person.
ECHO-KG
An echocardiogram is such a modern method of functional diagnosis of cardiovascular diseases, in which the doctor receives the main useful data through the use of ultrasound equipment. The event helps to imagine how preserved the ability of the heart to be an active pump. Scanning using a special device gives data on the structure of the fibers forming the main muscle of the body. If the heart valves are transformed or cannot function normally, ECHO-KG will give a clear reflection of this fact. According to the results of the study, the doctor will know what is the contractility of the organ as a whole, how large are the heart cavities, whether the thickness of the walls existing in the structure of the organ is large.
ECHO-KG is a modern and reliable, safe method that gives an accurate idea of the presence of an aortic aneurysm, thrombus, tumor process. Through this approach, hypertension, ischemia, and heart defects can be diagnosed.
Special case: children get sick
Studies have shown that the heart and vascular system in childhood have several distinctive features in comparison with those inherent in an adult. The heart of a barely born child is much larger as a percentage compared with the body than an adult. The organ is actively growing, by the age of three it becomes about three times larger than at the time of birth, and after another three years it will be 11 times larger than the original size. The specificity of the regulation of internal processes, local metabolism is such that the heart of a child contracts faster than an adult. The pulse of the just born normal is about 150 beats, the one-year standard is 140, the five-year standard is 100, and by adolescence it reaches the inherent in adults, that is, about 80 muscle contractions.
The specificity of instrumental, laboratory diagnostics of cardiovascular diseases in childhood is associated with the frequency of occurrence of various diseases. So, children are more often diagnosed with congenital malformations, rheumatic fever and tachycardia. There is a possibility of increased or decreased arterial vascular pressure. Arrhythmia is often diagnosed.
New methods
Radiation diagnosis of diseases of the cardiovascular system is one of the most promising approaches for the early diagnosis of pathologies of the heart and blood vessels. Such methodologies in recent years are an extremely important part of the diagnostic complex practiced in advanced hospitals. Using specialized instruments, structural corrections of the heart muscle can be detected in time. However, there were some problems. The structural, functional, geometric corrections of the heart muscle and cardiac ventricle on the left, accompanying pathologies of the heart and blood vessels, have not yet been studied to the desired extent. Typological features due to the pathological condition have not been investigated.
Radiation methods include radiography, X-ray television research, echocardiography, doppleroecho-KG. In addition, non-invasive radiation methods and echocardiography are used, in which special contrast agents are injected into the vein. In some cases, shown radiocardiography, scintigraphy. CT, MRI can be beneficial. Invasive methods include coronary angiocardiography. Angiopulmonography, ventriculography, aortography are three more popular approaches practiced in x-ray departments as part of the diagnosis of heart and vascular pathologies.
Read More: Radiography
The main instrumental methods for the diagnosis of cardiovascular diseases currently belongs to radiography. The event is organized in three classical projections: directly, sideways, left or right along the oblique. As statistical studies show, among other approaches to clarifying the diagnosis, this is one of the most commonly practiced. Since the event gives an idea of the pattern of the lungs and their roots, the doctor can analyze the dynamics of the blood, limit venous congestion. You can evaluate how big the heart is, what is its configuration. With an X-ray examination, calcification of the heart valves, arteries that feed the organ, pericardium is determined. You can immediately determine whether there are lesions in other parts of the body that are similar in symptoms to diseases of the heart system.
X-ray analysis provides information on the functional symptoms of the condition. A comprehensive radiation examination of the patient usually gives sufficient data even without oblique projections. The current classical approach is such that first of all they resort to the main instrumental method for the diagnosis of cardiovascular diseases - two-projection radiography. Pictures are taken on the left side and front right. In order to more accurately assess cardiac functionality, it is necessary to make the esophagus contrast in lateral examination. On average, only 15% of the subjects need additional research in an oblique projection.
Coronarography
This technique for diagnosing diseases of the cardiovascular system allows you to evaluate how sick the arteries that feed the heart are. A catheter is transported through the thigh to the aorta, and from there to the coronary vessel. A substance is added that gives contrast in an x-ray study. Three milliliters of medicine is enough. This approach allows you to objectively localize the narrowing of the vascular lumen, to determine the progress of the process and the duration of the pathological site. The doctor receives information about collateral blood flow. In parallel, endovascular dilatation is allowed.
This technique for the diagnosis of diseases of the cardiovascular system is used if the likelihood of complications in a non-invasive study is assessed as high. It is necessary to resort to this approach, if clinical observations show cardiac ischemia without symptoms or make it possible to suspect such a disease. Measures are indicated if drugs are ineffective in angina pectoris, if this pathology has formed in an unstable version, is not corrected by drugs, was preceded by a heart attack, impaired left ventricular functionality.
Aortography
This type of diagnosis of cardiovascular disease is prescribed when the doctor needs accurate data on the condition of the aorta. This is an x-ray approach involving the use of contrast compounds. Mostly shown is an introduction to Seldinger technology. The event is recommended if the aortic valve is not working actively enough, the aortic defect is complex. If the vessel develops atypically, the method gives an idea of the course of the process. With vessel lesions, aortography helps to formulate an accurate diagnosis and separate the case from others with similar manifestations.
This method of diagnosing cardiovascular diseases is indicated if it is necessary to assess the state of the vascular system. It is recommended to resort to it when clinical observations and the results of dopplerocardiography do not allow an unambiguous conclusion. If the diagnosis is in doubt, this approach is used to clarify the disease.
Angiocardiography
When choosing a treatment, the diagnosis of cardiovascular diseases in this way is indicated if it is necessary to study not only the heart, but also the large vascular elements that feed it. Use a probe inserted through arteries, veins on the periphery. If you need to study the organ in the right half, puncture of the femoral or brachial vein is shown on the right, if on the left - on the opposite side of the body. This method of assessing the condition of the patient gives an accurate idea of the content of different gases in the blood, helps to clarify the pressure indicators not only in the vessels, but also in the heart cavity. The doctor will have accurate data on volumes per minute, discharge. They record phono- and electrocardiograms, determine in which direction the blood is discharged.
As part of the diagnosis, treatment and prevention of cardiovascular diseases, various methods for studying the condition with the use of catheters are used very often, because they allow you to enter into the circulatory system substances that are contrastively reflected in the study by x-rays. Angiocardiography is not an exception, in which a small quality of special compounds is injected into the patient's body through a catheter, helping to remove a series of accurate radiographs.
Not just tools: lab tests
The relevance of laboratory diagnosis of cardiovascular disease should not be underestimated. For research activities, the patient needs blood from a vein. To ensure the result is accurate, they give up alcohol in a day. Children under one year of age should not be eaten for 40 minutes preceding the blood sampling. Children under the age of five should refrain from eating for three hours. Persons older need a twelve-hour fast. You can drink water without gas and additives. , – . . .
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Blood screening results give an idea of the state of the vascular system, heart. They are useful in a comprehensive assessment of the condition and the choice of therapeutic course. Tests performed regularly during treatment reflect how appropriate the course is and how the patient progresses. If there are manifestations of diseases, suspicions of illness, blood screening simplifies the diagnosis, helps confirm or refute the doctor’s assumptions. Laboratory examinations are an element of preventive measures aimed at preventing and early detection of pathologies of the heart and blood vessels. If the patient is hospitalized, a blood test must be done without fail.
The reasons that provoke an increase or decrease in the concentration of compounds relative to the norm are different. In each individual case, the doctor individually determines what triggered the disorder. The specialist’s task is to evaluate the results of screening in isolation, then superimpose them on the results of other instrumental and laboratory examinations. Only after this is the final diagnosis formulated.