In this article, we will consider the first signs of a heart attack.
This pathology is focal ischemic necrosis of the heart muscle, which develops as a result of acute coronary circulatory disorders. The clinical picture of this condition is characterized by burning, pressing or compressing pain behind the sternum, giving to the left hand, shoulder blade, clavicle, jaw, as well as shortness of breath, panic, cold sweat. Myocardial infarction is an indication for emergency hospitalization of a patient in cardiological resuscitation, and in the absence of medical care, a fatal outcome can occur.
Therefore, it is so important to recognize the signs of a heart attack in a timely manner.
Causes of myocardial infarction
A heart attack is a big threat to human life and a condition when some parts of the heart muscle begin to die. The main cause of necrosis is oxygen starvation or hypoxia, which occurs for various reasons. They can conditionally be divided into two categories. The first includes diseases, which in this case can be called the root cause - vascular atherosclerosis, angina pectoris, chronic heart failure, and others. Such pathologies lead to an increased need for oxygen in the organ, as well as a violation of the transport functions of the vessels. The second category includes non-specific causes - sports or high physical activity. In this case, the heart's need for oxygen increases significantly, but it does not always get it in the right amount. A sedentary lifestyle and various bad habits can also provoke the development of hypoxia.
Signs of a heart attack
Myocardial infarction is very dangerous, because the first emergency symptoms should be provided to the patient with the right emergency care. Otherwise, he may not wait for the arrival of doctors, because pathology is often accompanied by cardiogenic shock and heart failure.
The main signs of myocardial infarction in men are:
- Strong pain. Often a person finds it difficult to explain what the nature of the pain syndrome is. He feels in the region of the heart either compressive pains, then cutting and stitching, a burning sensation in the sternum may be observed. Pathology is characterized by a transition of pain to the left side of the body. Most often, it extends to the arm, shoulder, neck and face. This symptom must be immediately eliminated, otherwise, the risk of developing cardiogenic shock is high. What other signs and symptoms of myocardial infarction are possible?
- Weakness, which is accompanied by pallor of the skin and mucous membranes, the patient has shortness of breath, he may complain of a lack of air.
- Panic and fear - a sharp pain in the heart causes shock in a person, which must be eliminated. Nervous overstrain in such a case is the worst enemy provoking complications of a heart attack.
- Cold sweat as a sign of a heart attack. Even if the room is not hot, people during a heart attack often experience hot flashes of sweat, which is due to strong drops in blood pressure and interruptions in the work of the heart.
- Tachycardia. Often with heart attacks, there is a rapid heartbeat. The pulse may malfunction, increase, or, conversely, slow down.
All of the above conditions are the first signs of myocardial infarction. If you recognize the pathology immediately and provide emergency assistance to the patient, many serious consequences can be avoided.
Pain with a heart attack may not be observed at all, in this case people do not even suspect that they have suffered a heart attack. A heart attack then is determined only on a cardiogram, where you can clearly see the functional changes in the myocardium.
Consider also the signs of a heart attack in women.
Symptoms in the fairer sex
It should be noted that in women the pain syndrome with the development of this pathology is less pronounced. What this is connected with is still unknown to science. Some experts attribute this to a higher pain threshold; others emphasize that women simply often endure pain and get used to it. But even in this case, first aid must be provided. Signs of a heart attack in a woman 50 years old may be absent.
If you take into account the peculiarities of the woman’s body, you can highlight the symptoms of acute heart attack that appear long before it occurs, which makes it possible to prevent this pathology. Among men, such symptoms do not occur, but women, for a certain time before a heart attack, may complain of swelling that can occur in different parts of the body, which is provoked by the accumulation of blood due to disturbances in the cardiovascular system. Also, women often become disturbed by sleep disturbance, which is practically not eliminated with the help of sedatives, outdoor walks in the evening, and other activities that are usually taken in cases of insomnia.
Women may complain of abdominal pain, because their diaphragm is slightly higher than that of men, and with a heart attack, heart pain can go to the upper abdomen.
Another main symptom and the first sign of myocardial infarction is fatigue, which appears even with minimal exertion, and does not disappear after rest or a long vacation.
Pain as the main symptom
Pain with this pathology is of the same nature as with angina pectoris, however, it has a significant duration and, as a rule, a higher intensity. Nevertheless, there are known cases of the occurrence of heart attacks, accompanied by relatively minor pain or proceeding without pain at all (the so-called “painless” heart attack). This means that although pain is one of the main first signs of a heart attack, they are not necessarily present. When a similar pathology of the heart occurs, pain occurs in approximately 93% of cases. The first signs of a heart attack in men and women can be very difficult to recognize.
It should be noted that some information in the recognition of a heart attack gives the effect of nitroglycerin, since it is known that the usual attack of angina pectoris after taking this substance, as well as other vasodilators, as a rule, ceases within a few minutes, while the anginal effects of a heart attack after taking nitroglycerin does not disappear. From this it follows that the difference between the occurrence of attacks of angina pectoris and the first signs of a heart attack is the reversibility of such pathological processes that lead to the appearance of pain. With "angina pectoris", such processes are very short-lived, and the acute coronary insufficiency provoked by them, as a rule, soon passes. In myocardial infarction, the changes that cause acute developing coronary artery insufficiency are irreversible, last for a long time and can only be compensated by other mechanisms over time.
It is important to be able to distinguish the signs of a heart attack in men over 50 from the symptoms of angina pectoris.
The difference between a heart attack and angina
The reason, which in this case plays the main role, are considered to be thrombi formed in the coronary arteries. Myocardial infarction is considered by some experts as the result of acute cardiac thrombosis. This view allows you to fundamentally distinguish between "angina pectoris", in which thrombosis of the blood vessels of the heart does not occur, from myocardial infarction, as a result of persistent occlusion of coronary lumens by thrombotic masses.
Although thrombosis of the arteries of the heart is often detected in a heart attack, this does not occur in 30% of cases. In addition, it can occur much later. Therefore, it is impossible to diagnose myocardial infarction as coronary artery thrombosis. A blood clot is usually not the cause of a blockage in its lumen; on the contrary, it is a consequence of it. It is also undeniable that coronary obstruction can be caused directly by a blood clot. Obviously, a thrombotic plug that forms in the narrowed section of a specific artery or in the area of ​​its long spasm should aggravate coronary insufficiency to a high degree, turning it into obstruction of the artery.
So, thrombosis in coronary atherosclerosis is an essential hallmark of a heart attack in men from angina pectoris.
Of great importance in the development of a heart attack is also the degree of atherosclerosis, the formation of atherosclerotic plaques that protrude in the lumen of the coronary vessel and close it. In some cases, clogging of the artery lumen with a gruel mass occurs when the atherosclerotic plaque is destroyed, or hemorrhage provoked by the breakdown of the atheromatous foci into the walls of the affected artery, when such a hematoma inflates the inner layer of the artery wall.
Dyspnea
Myocardial infarction from the moment of its occurrence is often accompanied by symptoms of severe shortness of breath. A similar asthmatic variant of this pathology usually does not accompany pain. The cause of suffocation in a heart attack is an acute development of insufficiency of contractile functions of the heart and a sharp decrease in pressure provoked by this, which enhances the general state of hypoxemia. It, in turn, affects the redox property of the myocardium in both parts of the heart. Thus, left ventricular failure can turn into total failure, which, as a rule, exacerbates the asthmatic condition of the patient. What other signs and symptoms of a heart attack in men and women are possible?
From the nervous system
It often happens that the onset of a heart attack is accompanied by a number of negative neuro-brain phenomena in the form of dizziness, fainting, a state of agitation, or vice versa, inhibition of mental activity, vomiting, headache. Sometimes the initial signs of a heart attack are very similar to those that occur during strokes: a state of stunning, confusion is observed, violations of the motor functions develop in the form of paresis or paralysis of the limbs. Malfunctions of the bulbar centers may occur, which is accompanied by a disturbance in speech and vision. Such "cerebral" forms of heart attack are often mistaken for a stroke.
This option of the initial signs of a heart attack is constantly being discussed in the medical literature and various explanations are put forward. Some authors talk about the coincidence of two separate exacerbations of atherosclerosis - in the vessels of the brain and heart, which leads to a combination of heart attack and stroke. It is likely that the concurrent formation of blood clots in the coronary and cerebral vessels is directly relevant. Others note the importance of vasomotor disorders, which cover these vessels at the same time and cause their parallel spasm.
Shock and pressure reduction
Shock and collapse are the initial signs of a heart attack, which often accompany this pathological phenomenon. In this case, a significant violation of the functions of the blood supply to the brain occurs, which usually leads to the shutdown of some of its functions. The importance of hypoxia as a result of heart failure is also important. Brain disorder can be called reflected or reflex. A study of the brain of people who died of a heart attack revealed a number of significant changes. Along with the simultaneous development of atherosclerosis of the arteries of the brain and signs of heart failure, minor hemorrhages and foci of ischemia in certain parts of the brain were detected. Thrombosis, as well as major cerebral hemorrhages, were not detected.
In severe forms of cardiogenic collapse, wheezing in the airways, coughing and pulmonary edema with the formation of foamy sputum, which has blood impurities, are characteristic. Venous pressure in such cases rises, and the liver increases, which is most often observed with a heart attack that seizes the right ventricle or affects the papillary muscles.
A typical initial sign of a heart attack is a decrease in blood pressure. It occurs in almost 90% of cases, and not only when cardiogenic collapse occurs. In the first hours after a heart attack, blood pressure may be elevated. But very soon - around the end of the first day, it begins to fall. This phenomenon is most clearly defined in people who have previously suffered from hypertension. As a rule, systolic pressure decreases. The larger the heart attack, the faster hypotension occurs.
We examined the first signs of a heart attack. First aid should be immediate.
How to recognize a heart attack?
This pathology is one of the types of ischemic disease, which is fraught with irreversible changes in the heart muscle, which is caused by changes in the coronary arteries. If such a condition occurs, the patient requires urgent medical attention.
To save life, it is important to recognize a pathological condition in a timely manner. Myocardial infarction is characterized by rather specific signs, in many respects similar to the symptoms of other diseases, and in some cases they may be completely absent. The localization and vastness of the zone of damage to the heart muscle, as well as the individual characteristics of the patient, cause various manifestations of this disease.
What signs of a heart attack are, not everyone knows.
Symptoms of focal heart attack
During such a pathology, necrosis of a large myocardial zone occurs. With the development of this form of myocardial infarction, several stages are distinguished, which are characterized by a certain set of manifestations. These stages are:
- A pre-infarction condition, which is characterized by painful attacks of angina pectoris, a feeling of depression and anxiety. In some cases, there is a lack of pre-infarction phenomena, and the development of the disease begins immediately from the acute period.
- The acute period is characterized by severe pain that occurs suddenly and persists for a rather long time. This is an indicator of the capture and damage of myocardial infarction zones. The pain in this case is burning, it varies in intensity and is localized, as a rule, in the chest, in its left part. Pain can radiate to the back, shoulder blades, left shoulder and lower jaw.
Symptoms of small focal infarction
With the development of a similar form of heart attack, the symptoms are more weakly expressed. The pain syndrome is not as intense as with an extensive form of the disease, as well as a decrease in pressure and heart failure. Small focal infarction is easier to carry and causes fewer complications.
Help with a heart attack
About half of all cases of death from a similar pathological phenomenon occur due to the inability to provide the patient with the necessary assistance. This is because many people do not know how to behave in case of a heart attack, or what measures should be taken with the initial signs of pathology in a person nearby. However, with myocardial infarction, the road is almost every minute
If the first signs of such a condition occur, first of all, emergency medical care should be called. By phone, you should describe the symptoms and indicate what is needed, in this case, a specialized team - resuscitation or cardiology. In order to reduce the time of arrival of doctors, it is advisable to meet them at the entrance.
In anticipation of specialists at the first signs of myocardial infarction, the patient needs to ensure peace by giving it a horizontal position. In this case, it is necessary to free his body from tight clothing, and also open a window in the room to ensure the flow of fresh air.
With symptoms and the first signs of a heart attack in men, sometimes excessive motor excitement can be observed. In this case, you must ensure that he does not get up, showing all sorts of activity. If necessary, keep it horizontal, even if you have to use force.
The patient should be reassured by talking with him in a calm voice, since stress will only exacerbate the pathological condition. A person who is next to the patient bears a great responsibility for his life, therefore, he himself should not panic and be nervous.
With signs of a heart attack, help is very important.
In order to relieve pain, you need to put a tablet of nitroglycerin under the tongue or give it in the form of a spray.If a heart attack after this does not stop within 10 minutes, this event should be repeated immediately. It is important to note that this substance is contraindicated in cases when the pressure drops sharply during a heart attack . In addition, it is important to consider that more than three tablets of nitroglycerin cannot be given to a patient.
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