HEALTH PLUS MED­ICAL COR­RE­SPON­DENT

What if your heart ex­pe­ri­enced a heart at­tack and you were too busy to no­tice?

Does this sound bizarre? It is not. In fact, re­cent re­search sug­gests that near­ly half of all heart at­tacks are silent heart at­tacks.

“Peo­ple have this idea of the Hol­ly­wood heart at­tack, which is a man squeez­ing his chest, the feel­ing of the bal­loon about to burst,” says clin­i­cal car­di­ol­o­gist Dr Malis­sa Wood, Har­vard Med­ical School. “When peo­ple don’t have that clas­sic symp­tom that they’ve seen or heard about, they think, ‘Well, this must be some­thing else.” Dr Wood con­tin­ues, “If you have to google ‘chest pain’ or ‘chest dis­com­fort,’ then prob­a­bly you first need to call 911.”

Down­right de­nial and the typ­i­cal med­ical lit­er­a­ture search­es for “Heart At­tack” tell tale symp­toms can com­pli­cate mat­ters and is the per­fect com­bi­na­tion for mis­in­for­ma­tion.

The heart beats about 2.5 bil­lion times over the av­er­age life­time, push­ing mil­lions of gal­lons of blood to every part of the body. This steady flow car­ries with it oxy­gen, fu­el, hor­mones, oth­er com­pounds, and a host of es­sen­tial cells. It al­so whisks away the waste prod­ucts of me­tab­o­lism. When the heart stops, es­sen­tial func­tions fail, some al­most in­stant­ly.

Giv­en the heart’s nev­er-end­ing work­load, it’s a won­der it per­forms so well, for so long, for so many peo­ple. But it can al­so fail, brought down by a poor di­et and lack of ex­er­cise, smok­ing, in­fec­tion, un­lucky genes, and more.

You of­ten don’t know you are hav­ing a silent heart at­tack. Many peo­ple don’t find out un­til weeks or months lat­er. The longer your heart doesn’t have ef­fi­cient blood flow, the more dam­age that oc­curs. Be­cause silent heart at­tacks may go un­no­ticed, they can cause a sig­nif­i­cant amount of dam­age. And with­out treat­ment, they can be dead­ly.

A Sur­vivor Sto­ry of a Silent Heart At­tack

Pa­tient AK: 45-year-old Body­builder, gym rat, re­tired se­mi pro foot­ball play­er.

The pa­tient was at the gym lift­ing weights to strength­en his shoul­ders and chest, he didn’t think much of the strain he felt in those ar­eas. “You get so used to those aches and pains and nicks and dings,” he says. “I thought I had pulled a mus­cle in my chest and shoul­der.”

But the dis­com­fort per­sist­ed, and the pa­tient phoned his wife. “I told her, ‘I’m not feel­ing well, I may end my gym rou­tine ear­ly.’” She told him to head straight for the hos­pi­tal a mile down the road, but he then told her, “I think it’s just a mus­cle strain” and he was go­ing home to lie down. But first he need­ed to com­plete his round of weights. “That took about five min­utes, and by the time I was done, I could bare­ly stand up. I felt slight dis­com­fort with­in my chest, but an over­whelm­ing ex­haus­tion and I prayed I wasn’t hav­ing a heart at­tack.” He called his wife again and asked her to take him to the hos­pi­tal.

The pa­tient’s vi­tals were fine. But a car­diac catheter­i­za­tion re­vealed sig­nif­i­cant block­ages in three of his ar­ter­ies that re­quired emer­gency surgery for restora­tion and to pre­vent fur­ther heart at­tacks from oc­cur­ring.

SYMP­TOMS of silent heart at­tacks

The symp­toms of a silent heart at­tack are not as se­vere as those for a reg­u­lar heart at­tack. They can of­ten be mis­tak­en for oth­er con­di­tions. Some peo­ple feel no symp­toms at all. Pay at­ten­tion when you feel any of the fol­low­ing:

DIS­COM­FORT – You may feel dis­com­fort in the up­per ab­domen, in your back, or in your jaw. It could feel like you’ve strained a mus­cle.

SHORT­NESS OF BREATH – If you are feel­ing short of breath or hav­ing trou­ble breath­ing do­ing small ac­tiv­i­ties, it could be a sign of a heart at­tack.

HEART­BURN – Mild pain in the throat or chest can be mis­tak­en for gas­tric re­flux, in­di­ges­tion or heart­burn.

FA­TIGUE & LIGHT­HEAD­ED – Phys­i­cal dis­com­fort or feel­ing very tired can be signs of many things. When they hap­pen with a silent heart at­tack, they are of­ten mis­tak­en for oth­er things. These could in­clude poor sleep or age-re­lat­ed aches and pains.

What caus­es silent heart at­tacks?

Silent heart at­tacks are caused by the same things that cause tra­di­tion­al heart at­tacks. This hap­pens when part of the heart mus­cle is dam­aged or dies be­cause it has not re­ceived enough oxy­gen. This is of­ten due to a blocked artery in the heart.

How are silent heart at­tacks di­ag­nosed?

Many times, silent heart at­tacks are found dur­ing a rou­tine check-up. If your doc­tor thinks you may have had one, he or she may or­der spe­cif­ic car­diac in­ves­ti­ga­tions, blood tests and imag­ing. Hav­ing a silent heart at­tack puts you at a greater risk of hav­ing an­oth­er heart at­tack, which could be dead­ly. Hav­ing an­oth­er heart at­tack al­so in­creas­es your risk of com­pli­ca­tions, such as heart fail­ure.

Be­ing aware of the silent symp­toms of a heart at­tack is im­por­tant, but it does noth­ing if you ig­nore them.

Even if you’re not sure you’re hav­ing a heart at­tack, con­tact your Health Care provider if you ex­pe­ri­ence any or all of the symp­toms. While these signs don’t al­ways mean you’re hav­ing a heart at­tack, it’s bet­ter to be cau­tious. The chances of sur­viv­ing a heart at­tack are high­er the soon­er you get emer­gency treat­ment.

And re­mem­ber, the best way to pre­vent heart at­tacks in the first place is to get your heart screened, know­ing your risk and mak­ing ac­tive heart healthy steps to low­er­ing these risks.

Look out for HEALTH PLUS every Tues­day for more in­for­ma­tive and health­ful ar­ti­cles. If you have any ques­tions or con­cerns re­gard­ing this top­ic, please email Guardian­Health­Plus2020@gmail.com