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23/03/2020

Take care of your heart while at home!

Being in self-quarantine can lead people to adopt unhealthy eating habits. To avoid stress, exhaustion, and other negative consequences, make sure you follow a daily schedule and maintain a healthy lifestyle:

Continue doing exercise, eating a balanced diet, staying hydrated and getting adequate sleep.

Maintain your social network even remotely and communicate with your friends and family on a regular basis.

Limit the information you consume about the outbreak and the time you spend on it, and only trust reliable sources.

WHO recommends 150 minutes of moderate-intensity or 75 minutes of vigorous-intensity physical activity per week, or a combination of both. These recommendations can still be achieved even at home:

Take short active breaks during the day.

Follow an online exercise class.

Walk, stand up and relax.

UNITED WE CAN🙏✊❤

11/03/2020

People often think that a heart attack is the same thing as a cardiac arrest. This, however, is not true. In order to understand the difference between a heart attack and a cardiac arrest, it is first necessary to understand what happens in both of these processes.

What is a heart attack?

The heart is a muscle, and like all muscles it requires an oxygen-rich blood supply. This is provided to the heart by coronary arteries. A heart attack occurs when there is a blockage of the coronary arteries. This is often caused by a blood clot. Such a blockage, if not quickly resolved, can cause parts of heart muscle to begin to die. (1-3)

What is a cardiac arrest?

A cardiac arrest is different to a heart attack. In a cardiac arrest the heart actually stops beating; whereas in a heart attack the heart normally continues to beat even though the blood supply to the heart is disrupted.

10/03/2020

Cardiac electrophysiology: is the science of elucidating, diagnosing, and treating the electrical activities of the heart.

The term is usually used in a clinical context to describe studies of such phenomena by invasive (intracardiac) catheter recording of spontaneous activity as well as of cardiac responses to programmed electrical stimulation (PES), see Clinical cardiac electrophysiology.

Cardiac electrophysiology also encompasses basic research and translational research components.

Someone who studies cardiac electrophysiology, either clinically or solely through research, is known as a cardiac electrophysiologist.

09/03/2020

How the heart works

Chambers and valves of the heart

Your heart is a pump. It's a muscular organ about the size of your fist, situated slightly left of center in your chest. Your heart is divided into the right and the left side. The division prevents oxygen-rich blood from mixing with oxygen-poor blood. Oxygen-poor blood returns to the heart after circulating through your body.

The right side of the heart, comprising the right atrium and ventricle, collects and pumps blood to the lungs through the pulmonary arteries.

The lungs refresh the blood with a new supply of oxygen. The lungs also breathe out carbon dioxide, a waste product.

Oxygen-rich blood then enters the left side of the heart, comprising the left atrium and ventricle.

The left side of the heart pumps blood through the aorta to supply tissues throughout the body with oxygen and nutrients.

05/03/2020

Congenital heart defect - corrective surgery

Congenital heart defect corrective surgery fixes or treats a heart defect that a child is born with. A baby born with one or more heart defects has congenital heart disease. Surgery is needed if the defect could harm the child's long-term health or well-being.

04/03/2020

Explore and embrace your options

You had a heart attack. Now what?

It’s no surprise that many people feel scared, confused and overwhelmed after a heart attack. A heart attack represents a life-changing event.
After your treatment for heart attack, you likely received instructions and a lot of information from your doctor. With time to reflect, you may be trying to understand what happened. You’re sure to want to know what you can do to avoid heart problems in the future.
Navigating the road to recovery isn’t easy. Questions, confusion, uncertainty and even fear are common.

Make preventing another heart attack your first priority. Here are five things you can do:

Take your medications as prescribed. Certain medicines can greatly lower your risk of another cardiac event. That’s why it’s important for you to understand your medicines and take them correctly.

Attend your follow-up appointments. Attending your follow-up appointments will help your doctors keep track of your condition and recovery. You can make the most of your time with your doctor by preparing for your appointment.

Participate in cardiac rehabilitation. Cardiac rehabilitation is a medically supervised program designed to help you recover after a heart attack. You should have received a referral to cardiac rehab when you were discharged from the hospital – if you didn’t, ask your doctor about it. Learn more about cardiac rehab.

Get support. It’s normal to feel scared, overwhelmed or confused after a heart attack. Getting support from loved ones or from people who have also experienced a heart attack can help you cope. Connect with other heart attack survivors and caregivers through our Support Network.

Manage your risk factors. After a heart attack, it’s important to manage risk factors (such as high blood pressure, high cholesterol and diabetes) by taking medications, quitting smoking, eating healthy food and getting active. Find out more about managing your risk factors.

03/03/2020

Heart attack questions and answers

What is a heart attack?

Your heart muscle needs oxygen to survive. A heart attack occurs when the blood flow that brings oxygen to the heart muscle is severely reduced or cut off completely.
View an animation of blood flow between the heart and lungs.
This happens because coronary arteries that supply the heart muscle with blood flow can become narrowed from a buildup of fat, cholesterol and other substances that together are called plaque. This slow process is known as atherosclerosis.
When plaque within a heart artery breaks, a blood clot forms around the plaque. This blood clot can block the blood flow through the artery to the heart muscle.
Ischemia results when the heart muscle is starved for oxygen and nutrients. When damage or death of part of the heart muscle occurs as a result of ischemia, it’s called a heart attack, or myocardial infarction (MI).
About every 40 seconds, someone in the United States has a heart attack.

02/03/2020

Tips for Preventing Heart Disease

The following lifestyle changes can help treat and prevent heart disease:

Eat a healthy diet. Maintaining a heart healthy diet is key for preventing heart disease. The American Heart Association (AHA) recommends the Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension (DASH) eating plan for optimal heart health. The DASH diet focuses on heart-healthy foods that are low in fat, cholesterol, and sodium, and rich in nutrients, protein, and fiber. Foods to focus on include fruits and vegetables, whole grains, fat-free or low-fat dairy products, fish, poultry, and nuts. The DASH eating plan limits red meats, sweets, added sugars, and sugar-sweetened beverages. (4)

Exercise regularly. Physical activity has numerous benefits, including strengthening your heart and improving circulation. For optimal heart health, the AHA recommends at least 30 minutes of moderate-intensity aerobic activity five days a week, or at least 25 minutes of vigorous aerobic activity three days a week in addition to moderate- to high-intensity muscle-strengthening activity two days a week. (5)

Control your blood pressure. High blood pressure is one of the biggest risk factors for heart disease. Be sure to get tested regularly for high blood pressure. That means once a year for most adults, and more often as directed if your blood pressure is high. (6) According to the AHA, a normal blood pressure reading is 120/80 millimters of mercury (mmHg). Once you get above this range, your risk of cardiovascular disease increases. Lifestyle changes and medication can help lower blood pressure. (7)

Keep cholesterol under control. High cholesterol can clog your arteries and raise your risk of coronary artery disease and heart attack. Again, your doctor will prescribe lifestyle changes and medication, if needed, to lower your cholesterol.

Maintain a healthy weight. Being overweight or obese significantly increases the risk of heart disease since it raises the risk of other heart disease risk factors, including high blood pressure, high cholesterol, and diabetes. Controlling weight through a healthy diet and exercise will help prevent these conditions and lower your risk of heart dis

02/03/2020

26/02/2020

Understand Your Risks to Prevent a Heart Attack

Knowledge is power. Understand the risks you face for heart attack.Extensive research has identified factors that increase a person’s risk for coronary heart disease in general and heart attack in particular.

The more risk factors you have, and the greater the degree of each risk factor, the higher your chance of developing coronary heart disease – a common term for the buildup of plaque in the heart’s arteries that could lead to heart attack. Risk factors fall into three broad categories:

Major risk factors – Research has shown that these factors significantly increase the risk of heart and blood vessel (cardiovascular) disease.

Modifiable risk factors – Some major risk factors can be modified, treated or controlled through medications or lifestyle change.

Contributing risk factors – These factors are associated with increased risk of cardiovascular disease, but their significance and prevalence haven’t yet been determined.

The American Heart Association recommends focusing on heart disease prevention early in life. To start, assess your risk factors and work to keep them low. The sooner you identify and manage your risk factors, the better your chances of leading a heart-healthy life.

21/02/2020

Cardiac arrest vs Heart attack

A heart attack is when one of the coronary arteries becomes blocked.

The heart muscle is robbed of its vital blood supply and, if left untreated, will begin to die because it is not getting enough oxygen.

A cardiac arrest is when a person's heart stops pumping blood around their body and they stop breathing normally.

20/02/2020

How is heart failure identified?

In infants, heart failure often presents with breathing trouble, poor feeding, poor growth, excessive sweating or even low blood pressure. At times, heart failure can look like other problems such as colic, pneumonia or other respiratory infections. Often parents may note that an infant takes longer to feed or becomes uninterested in feeding after a short time. If heart failure is caused by too rapid a heartbeat, parents may feel the rapid heartbeat through the chest wall when the infant is sleeping or resting quietly.
Older children and teenagers may complain of becoming tired quickly, especially if a virus infection has caused heart muscle damage.
If your physician suspects that your child may be experiencing heart failure symptoms, a chest X-ray may help determine if the heart is enlarged. You also may be referred to a pediatric heart specialist – such as a pediatric or congenital heart cardiologist – for further evaluation and testing.
Additional tests can include an electrocardiogram (EKG or ECG) to evaluate the heart rhythm or an ultrasound of the heart (echocardiogram) to evaluate heart structure and function. Both tests are simple and are typically performed in the physician’s office or clinic. Neither test is painful. However, depending on your child’s age and ability to cooperate, light sedation may be necessary for the best test results.
Sometimes, older children (usually older than 4) may be asked to perform an exercise stress test to evaluate heart-lung function.
At times, a more detailed and invasive test called a heart catheterization study may be required. In this test, a small plastic tube (called a catheter) is placed inside the heart from a blood vessel in the leg or arm. The catheter is used to record pressures and the amount of oxygen in the different parts of the heart. Commonly, a small amount of an X-ray dye (or contrast) material is injected to make a movie of the heart function and coronary arteries. The child usually receives deep sedation to ensure the best results. Since this test is performed in a special catheterization procedure room or laboratory, a short admission to a hospital is often necessar