Everything you need to know about a Heart attack and what to do until help arrives

Welcome to another post and here we will talk about a very scary situation - A heart attack or Myocardial infarction as doctors call it. Here we will talk about the symptoms you have, how to identify a heart attack and what to do in such situations. Read on - may save a life one day!

Whenever we say heart attack, the first thing that comes to mind is chest pain, but believe me there can be many reasons for it. It can be any one of the following:

• Stomach and food pipe problems

• Heart problems

• Lung problems

• Muscles / bone problems

• Psychiatric problems

and believe us when we say all of these will cause chest pain, and yes stomach problems too, they are the most common cause of chest pain. We will talk about the others in another article, let's talk about heart attack and how to identify it first because it's the most serious one.

What is a heart attack and how is it caused:

This is how a real heart looks like, very different from the shapes everyone draws ain't it? See those red and blue blood vessels*. They are called coronary vessels. These vessels provide oxygen to the heart for it to keep beating. If these get blocked, by any reason, commonly due to atherosclerosis (Fat/Calcium plaques getting deposited inside our blood vessels), the heart can't get enough oxygen and that part of the heart dies. This is called a heart attack.

Symptoms of a heart attack

1! Chest pain is the most common symptom, but as I said, it can occur due to many other causes too.

• How to differentiate chest pain due to heart attack or other causes?

  • No, the answer isn't left sided. You know left sided chest pain is the most common one, but right sided chest pain may actually be much more characteristic of a heart attack. So, the pain in a heart attack will be constricting, like someone has held your heart in their hand and squeezing it tightly. Your chest will feel heavy, like someone has placed a brick over it. The pain will be very severe too. The inner side of your left arm might hurt too, shoulders, neck, even the other arm will hurt. The pain will last for a long time, usually more than half an hour and even after sitting or lying down, it'll still not go away. If the pain is like this, it is likely to be a heart attack and you should call an ambulance immediately.

The sites of pain

2! The other symptom is breathing difficulty. Usually this also almost always happens in a heart attack. You will feel short of breath, like you had just run a marathon. If it's only pain, and there is no shortness of breath, most likely you're safe and it isn't a heart attack. But do keep in mind the characteristics of heart attack pain.

3! You might feel like you have upset stomach and about to vomit

4! You might have excessive sweating, pale and cool skin

The above symptoms make it very likely that you're having a heart attack. Call an ambulance immediately or prepare a vehicle to take you to the Emergency department of the nearest hospital.

What can you do if you think you're having a heart attack?

1. Call an ambulance.

2. Bed rest. Do not do any work, and just lie down and try to relax. Worrying will make it worse as it makes your heart beat faster and it would need more oxygen which is already insufficient in that moment. So try to relax and keep your heart rate low

3. If you take medications for angina like GTN (Glycerile trinitrate), keep it under your tongue. If the pain isn't cured, You are having a heart attack. If you don't have GTN or have never heard of it, skip this step.

4. DO NOT DO THIS ONE IF YOU HAVE ANY BLEEDING DISORDER. If you don't have a bleeding disorder, take 4 tablets of aspirin(disprin/ecosprin) 80-100mg each or 1 tablet of 325mg, keep them in your mouth and chew. Spread them around the insides of your mouth, cheeks everywhere. This will reduce the damage your heart takes. Don't forget to inform that you've already done this to the emergency doctors so that they don't give more.

Remember, Most deaths occur within first hour of the onset of pain, time is very essential. So, if the symptoms of heart attack come, and it's been 5 minutes and the pain is there, call an ambulance immediately and rush to emergency. Timely treatment and proper prehospital care can save many lives. Be educated, Be empowered, More power to you.

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*vessels= arteries and veins, the tubes that carry blood in our bodies.