A reason to listen to your Heart

Article written by :
Dr. Ashok Bandyopadhyay
MS, MCh
Clinical Director, Dept of Cardiothoracic Surgery, Peerless Hospital, Kolkata

After a certain point of time, the calling of the heart, in strictly medical sense, is inevitable for most of us. Some people simply ignore the symptom, while others prefer despair over the devil-may-care attitude. Well, not anymore. With a little effort and medical assistance, coronary heart diseases can now be tamed and patients can live a happy and healthy life.

Healthy diet and regular physical exercises help people to fight out heart ailments. Seasonal fruits are well within the reach of common people, and raw vegetables can provide huge benefits in this regard. Junk food must be avoided and physical exercise is very important. One is strongly advised to walk for 30 to 40 minutes each day to keep fit. Heart patients are also advised to consume fat free food and also avoid red meat as much as possible.

Other than congenital and normal factors, there are several modifiable factors leading to coronary heart diseases in today’s world. These factors include high blood pressure, diabetes, obesity and hypertension. All these are related to drastic lifestyle changes and each of them can pose serious health hazards by exposing more and more patients to coronary heart diseases.

Heart attacks are the biggest risk of coronary heart diseases. If left untreated for a period of time, it can cause permanent damage or death of heart muscle tissues. If symptoms like chest pain and sweating occur, measuring the blood pressure should be the first step taken. If the pressure is on the higher side a sorbitrate (5mg) can be given under the patient’s tongue and immediately rushed to the hospital. Chest X-ray, ECG, TMT, eco-cardiogram and coronary angiogram are preferably necessary for the patient.

Over the years, drug abuse has become a major factor triggering heart ailments among young people. Some drugs do not dissolve in the blood stream and also may become particles that block flow. This is a major reason why coronary heart diseases are seen in the youth these days.

With the fantastic advancement in medical science, people can now lead normal lives, even overcome coronary heart ailments. However they have to follow certain guidelines suggested by physicians and cardiac care team.