Ischemic heart disease (IHD) is a disease characterized by disturbance of blood supply to the heart due to narrowing and occlusion of coronary artery with atherosclerotic plaques. As a result of progression of atherosclerosis vascular lumen is gradually decreased, and as a result, blood flow to the heart is slowed down, whereby the myocardium (heart muscle) loses the necessary power.
Risk Factors:
- Unbalanced diets that promote blood cholesterol levels.
- Overweight.
- Lack of exercise.
- Smoking and alcohol abuse.
- Hypertensive heart disease.
- Diabetes.
- Chronic stress.
- Inborn and inherited diseases.
- Signs of coronary artery disease.
The main symptom of the disease is pain. However, in the early stages of the disease patients may be concerned about a feeling of discomfort in their chest during exercise, which goes away after a short while. People who have IHD not only feel pain in the chest, but it can also spread to the left arm, neck and the shoulder blade. Along with the increase of pain, patients with are faced with dyspnea – first under intense, later – performing simple actions (e.g, walking), and at later stages all the time. People with IHD often complain of palpitations (reinforced, frequent, strong perceivable beats) and interruptions (feeling chest fading) of the heart. Often these changes are recorded on an electrocardiogram. Besides the symptoms mentioned above, patients are accompanied by weakness, fatigue, dizziness, and, rarely, fainting. There are several forms of ischemic heart disease: sudden cardiac death, angina, myocardial infarction, myocardial infarction and arrhythmic form. We can say that the most formidable of these is angina. It is characterized by recurrent seizures that happen suddenly, often after physical or psycho-emotional stress. The patient feels a sense of lack of air, pain radiating to the neck, arm, shoulder blade, lower jaw. These attacks are provoked by factors like high blood pressure, alcohol, hearty meal, low temperatures. First aid in the event of angina is to eliminate the factors that trigger an attack – to calm a person down, stop the exercise. The following step would be to secure a flow of air and take a sedative. This tool expands the coronary vessels, a spasm of which is the reason for the attack. In the absence of timely assistance, a portion of heart muscle cells die from a lack of food – developing myocardial infarction.
Treatment of coronary heart disease:
Therapy for this disease should be appointed only by a doctor. An arsenal of medicines taken with IHD, is quite large, and usually the patient is taking several medications from different groups, namely nitrates – to prevent attacks; antiplatelet therapy – blood thinners (prevention of thrombotic events); blockers – normalize rhythm; calcium antagonists – expanding coronary vessels feeding the myocardium; statins and fibrates – reduce cholesterol in the blood; drugs that enhance metabolism in the cardiac muscle. Most of the drugs are prescribed for life and their self-cancellation is fraught with complications and deterioration.
Preventive measures:
Full, balanced, regular meals. Also, there is a list of products to be excluded from the ration: diet products, sources of cholesterol and saturated fats (fatty meat, bacon, sausages, dumplings, cream, oil, dairy products with a high percentage of fat). On the other hand, fruits, herbs, vegetables, lean meats, seafood and sea fish, low-fat dairy products, cereals, legumes, mushrooms, vegetable oils, nuts, etc are good for IHD patients and optimal for their diet. Weight is another great issue, to reduce weight, it is necessary to carefully monitor the high calorie foods, excluded from the diet animal fats and digestible carbohydrates. It is also useful to periodically arrange fasting days. Regular physical activity is helpful, but one should be careful, not to cross the line, as over exercise can be dangerous. Hiking, domestic work, therapeutic exercises – these simple measures will help to improve the performance of the heart. Absence of stress, refusal of bad habits like drinking alcohol and smoking, control of blood pressure, can help prevent IHD and heart diseases in general.
The main high-tech way to restore coronary artery is percutaneous transluminal balloon angioplasty. You can judge the essence of this manipulation on the basis of its name:
Percutaneous – indicates that the introduction of the catheter into the vessel through puncture of the skin.
Transluminal – means that all manipulations are carried out through the vessels.
Balloon – means that the recovery of the affected coronary artery lumen occurs by balloon inflation in vasoconstriction.
Coronary – means that the effects are on the coronary arteries, ie arteries supplying the heart.
Angioplasty – means that the impact made on the vessel (from the word “angio” – a vessel).
References
“Coronary Artery Disease (Ischemic Heart Disease).” Coronary Artery Disease (Ischemic Heart Disease). N.p., n.d. Web. 13 July 2014. <http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/heart_vascular_institute/conditions_treatments/conditions/coronary_artery.html>.
Rimmerman, Curtis M. “Coronary Artery Disease.” Coronary Artery Disease. N.p., n.d. Web. 13 July 2014. <http://www.clevelandclinicmeded.com/medicalpubs/diseasemanagement/cardiology/coronary-artery-disease/#s0175>.
Tardif, Jean-Claude. “Coronary Artery Disease in 2010.” European Heart Journal. Department of Medicine, Montreal Heart Institute and Université De Montréal, 5000 Belanger Str, Montreal, Canada H1T 1C8, n.d. Web. 13 July 2014. <http%3A%2F%2Feurheartjsupp.oxfordjournals.org%2Fcontent%2F12%2Fsuppl_C%2FC2.full>.