Heart attack or heart failure is a condition in which the heart is too weak to be able to contract and supply blood to various parts of the body to sufficiently meet the body’s needs at the time, even if the person has enough blood supply. For the most part, heart attacks occur in the final stages of heart disease and can also be caused by complications from other diseases.
Heart attack or heart failure is divided into 2 types, namely, failure in the left chambers of the heart and failure in the right chambers of the heart. Heart failure can occur as a result of heart conditions such as coronary artery disease, diseases of the heart muscles, heart valve problems, hypertension, or inflammation and infection of the heart muscles or valves, not to mention congenital heart disease, cardiac arrhythmia and exposure to toxins such as methamphetamine, liquor consumption and alcoholism. Common symptoms include excessive fatigue, coughing during physical exertions, breathing difficulty while at rest, chest congestion, panting while lying flat with improvements in symptoms when sitting up, loss of strength, edema, abdominal congestion, increased weight due to fluid retention not due to increased dietary intake and hypertension. Higher blood pressure can thicken the heart muscles and cause them to work harder, which can lead to failure.
The risk behaviors that can lead to heart disease and eventually heart attack or heart failure are smoking, eating fatty food, lack of exercise and being overweight (obese).
Signs of Heart Attack
Chest tightness: Most heart attacks are related to chest tightness that often occurs for longer than 2-3 minutes, or it happens intermittently. It might feel like you are being pressed or squeezed by something. It might feel tight and cause you to feel uncomfortable.
Displayed symptoms in the upper part of the body: There can be back pain, pain in one arm or both arms, neck and jaw pain and abdominal pain.
Shorter breaths: This symptom often follows chest tightness, and it can also happen before chest tightness.
Other symptoms: Panic, nausea and pain.
These symptoms can have many causes, including ischemic cardiomyopathy or acute myocardial infarction, heart failure, cardiac arrhythmia, etc., and they can happen in every ethnicity, sex and age from infancy to elderly. However, their causes will vary. Overall, they often occur in older people, and in developing countries the prevalence of heart attacks is about 2-3% of the entire population. In people older than 70 years old, the prevalence can be as high as 20-30%.
Causes of Heart Attacks
Ischemic heart disease (coronary artery disease) is the most common cause. It is a product of risk factors like diabetes, high cholesterol, smoking, etc.
A heart muscle disease known as dilated cardiomyopathy.
Heart valve disease such as heart valve regurgitation and heart valve stenosis.
Hypertension.
Other causes that are less common such as cardiac arrhythmia or exposure to a high dose of certain drugs or substances such as cocaine and alcohol, certain types of chemotherapy for treating cancer and amyloidosis in the heart muscles, etc.
Heart Attack Symptoms
Patients who experience minor symptoms might neglect to consult their doctors about them, and many patients only go to see the doctor after experiencing severe symptoms. As a result, following diagnosis of a heart attack/heart failure, you should be aware of the symptoms in order to observe them, and you should quickly consult your doctor when symptoms worsen.
Excessive fatigue. If you have heart disease and the symptoms are not very severe, you will experience fatigue only when heavily exerting yourself (dyspnea on exertion). However, as symptoms increase in severity, fatigue symptoms will also increase, and normal activities that you used to be able to perform will now cause you to feel tired. You will feel tired even while resting. If fatigue symptoms worsen, you need to quickly consult your doctor.
Fatigue onset within 1-2 hours after sleep that causes you to have to sit up for symptoms to improve. In some cases, the patient cannot lie down flat at all (orthopnea).
Feeling tired easily.
Edema in the feet or abdominal distension due to fluid retention.
Rapid weight gain.
Chronic cough, especially if you have red or pinkish discharges, which require urgent medical attention, since it might be a case of pulmonary edema.
Nausea and vomiting due to reduced blood supply to the digestive system.
Memory loss and confusion.
Heart palpitations and rapid heartbeat.
Treatment
Heart attack patients experience rapid damage to the heart muscles that lead the heart to fail. As a result, it is necessary to cooperate during treatment through the following:
Make changes to your lifestyle.
Use medications for treatment.
Treat the condition at the cause, such as through balloon angioplasty and heart valve surgery.
Wear a pacemaker.
In case of emergencies, you should collect yourself and make a rescue plan with the following preliminary care:
For patients with chest tightness or breathing difficulty, lie down with the head elevated or sit upright. If oxygen is available in the home, adjust the output to 4-6 liters for the patient. If there is chest pain, give the patient sublingual medication and have the patient wear lose clothing.
For patients who lose consciousness or pass out, have the patient lie down on his or her back with the face turned to the side or have the patient lie down on his or her side to prevent choking. You should not administer tonics or food, as doing so can lead to choking. Instead, provide oxygen and make a call to consult a doctor or urgently take the patient to the hospital.
