A heart attack can happen due to many causes. Read on to know more about those causes.
A heart attack or myocardial infarction occurs when the blood flow to the heart is blocked. Thus, it is unable to get the amount of oxygen it requires. Over a million people in the country have heart attacks every year. The lack of oxygen leads to the gradual death of tissues, causing lasting damage to the heart muscles. Read on to know more about the reasons for heart attack.
Common causes of heart attacks
The heart muscles need a consistent supply of oxygenated blood. The heart gets this crucial blood supply from the coronary arteries. A coronary artery disease can make these arteries narrow, which stops the regular flow of blood. A heart attack is a result when the blood supplies are blocked.
Inflammatory cells, proteins, calcium, and fat accumulate in the arteries to create plaques. Such plaque deposits remain hard from the outside, though they are mushy and soft on the inside.
The outer shell starts cracking when this plaque is hard, which is known as a rupture. The platelets, which are disc-shaped objects in the blood that help in clotting, reach the area, and clotting starts forming around this plaque. When the artery is blocked by a blood clot, the heart muscles starve for oxygen. Thus, the muscle cells die causing permanent damage.
Coronary arterial spasms might also lead to heart attacks in rare cases. During such coronary spasms, the arteries spasm or restrict on and off, cutting off the blood supply to the heart muscles (ischemia). It might happen when a person who does not have any history of heart disease is resting.
Every coronary artery delivers blood to a separate part of the heart muscle. The extent to which the muscle has been damaged is based on the size of the areas supplied by the blocked artery and the time between the treatment and attack.
The heart muscles begin to heal right after the heart attack, but the entire process takes about eight weeks, regardless of the causes of heart attack. Like skin wounds, there is a scar over the damaged part. However, the new scar tissues do not move like the rest of the heart. Thus, the heart is unable to pump sufficiently after the heart attack. The extent to which the capacity to pump is impacted is dependent on the location and size of the scar.
What are the risk factors for heart attack?
Certain factors tend to contribute more to the unwanted build-up of fatty deposits that narrow down the arteries in the body. Most of the risk factors can be mitigated or eliminated to reduce the chance of getting a first or recurrent heart attack. Though men over forty-five and women over fifty-five are more prone to have heart attacks, high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and tobacco consumption can increase the risks.
Thus, it is important to see a doctor and go for regular heart check-ups, along with giving up on tobacco, fast food, and unhealthy habits.
