Is Chest Pain A Definite Sign for Heart Attack?

When someone is having a serious pain in the chest, the first thing that comes to our mind is: is he or she having a heart attack (or myocardial infarction)?Serious pain in the chest seems to be an obvious sign of a heart attack. Researchers from the Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania, however, did not appear to agree.In their paper published in August 2011 in the ‘Annals of Emergency Medicine’, they pointed out that a high degree of pain does not indicate that someone entering the emergency room with chest pains is having a heart attack.After examining and following for 30 days more than 3,000 patients who arrived at the UPenn hospital emergency department complaining of chest pain, the researchers found that most severe chest pain was not a good predictor for identifying patients...

Heart Disease Can Be Caused By Childhood Hardship!

While a number of risk factors including diabetes, hypertension (high blood pressure), overweight, smoking and high alcohol intake can lead to heart disease, childhood hardship can well be one of them. Researchers from New Zealand's University of Otago revealed in the paper they published in August 2011 in ‘Archives of General Psychiatry’ that children who are abused, lose a parent or suffer other hardships might be at a higher risk of getting heart disease later in their life.Among more than 18,000 adults in 10 countries, the researchers found that those who said they had faced childhood adversities such as abuse, death of a parent, or a parent’s alcohol or drug abuse had a higher chance of getting heart disease, arthritis, asthma, diabetes and other conditions. Similar pattern was seen among...

Beware of Side Effects of Cardiac Medications

The modern healthcare scenario is somewhat muddled, as far as a layman is concerned, due to the claims and counterclaims made by different groups with differing opinions. The same is absolutely true to heart care medicines. Most prescription drugs claim to reduce cholesterol, clogging up of the arteries and other heart-related diseases, but in fact they have hidden but very obvious side effects which can, in the long term, can reduce the lifespan.As an example, we shall take up the case of Simvastatin, which is a hypolipidemic that is used for treating people suffering from high cholesterol and triglycerides. The medicine, to be truthful, helps preventing cardiovascular diseases and reduces the chances of heart strokes and attacks. The medicine is arguably good for administering in diabetes...

Why People Have Hypertension?

Hypertension, more commonly known as high blood pressure, could lead to hardening of arteries (atherosclerosis) and development of heart failure. That is why it has long been regarded as a major risk factor for heart disease. According to World Health Organization (WHO), around a billion people worldwide, including more than 200 million Chinese, suffer from hypertension.When the cause of hypertension can be identified, the condition is called secondary hypertension. Kidney disease is the highest risk factor for this type of hypertension. For majority of the hypertensive patients, the causes are not known, though several factors including smoking, high salt intake, stress, sedentary lifestyle, overweight or obese, high alcohol consumption, aging and genetics are believed to play an important...

What Is the Link Between Westernization and Heart Disease?

As a result of ‘Westernization’, the number of South Koreans with multiple risk factors for heart disease and diabetes has steadily increased. Westernization is the conversation to or adoption of western cultures including technology, politics, economics, lifestyle, diet, language and values. A study published online on April 19, 2011 in the journal ‘Diabetes Care’ reported that one-third of Korean adults have risk factors associated with diabetes and heart disease. Since the late-1990s, Korea has become more westernized. Researchers from Gil Medical Center in Incheon intended to look at Korea's changing rate of metabolic syndrome, a collection of risk factors for Type-2 diabetes, heart disease and stroke.Based on a periodic government health study on Korean adults aged 20 and above, the researchers...