Kardiol

Your doctor may order diagnostic tests if you are having signs or symptoms of a heart problem. Symptoms of the two most common heart rhythm disorders, atrial fibrillation and atrial flutter, include heart palpitations (feeling like your heart is racing, pounding or fluttering), shortness of breath or dizziness. There are several tests (listed here in alphabetical order) that can be done to check for a fast or irregular heartbeat: Read the rest of this entry »

Causes and symptoms

Bradycardia can be caused by medicines, including certain drugs used to treat high blood pressure and arrhythmias. More commonly, it is caused by a blockage somewhere along the heart’s electrical pathway. The blockage may be a product of a congenital heart problem, or of the normal aging process. Read the rest of this entry »

A diagnosis of heart failure means that your heart is having trouble pumping enough blood to meet your body’s needs. Your heart muscle may have been weakened by damage from any of these causes (although in some cases, there is no apparent cause):

• A prior heart attack
• Coronary artery disease (clogged blood vessels) Read the rest of this entry »

Although not true heart disorders, strokes are a related condition. While some strokes occur when a blood vessel bursts and causes bleeding in the brain, most strokes happen for the same reasons as a heart attack — Read the rest of this entry »

When arteries are clogged to the point of decreasing or stopping blood flow to the heart muscle, a lack of oxygen damages or kills heart muscle causing a heart attack. Recognizing symptoms and getting prompt emergency treatment can eliminate, Read the rest of this entry »

There are many types of syncope that have non-cardiovascular causes.

Neurocardiogenic syncope – the “common faint” – also is called “vasovagal syncope.” It usually (but not always) occurs when a person who is lying or sitting down moves to a standing position. From 25 percent to 40 percent of fainting disorders are due to neurocardiogenic syncope. It is the most common cause of fainting in young people. Some adolescents have frequent fainting spells, but many electrophysiologists and other physicians who treat syncope report that most of their young patients have “grown out” of the condition by the time they reach their mid-twenties. Read the rest of this entry »

About 90 percent of people who faint have cardiovascular syncope, the most serious type of fainting disorder. The risk of cardiovascular syncope increases with age, and those at greatest risk are people who have:

• Coronary artery disease, or CAD (clogged blood vessels to the heart), angina (chest pain caused by reduced blood flow to the heart) or a prior heart attack (myocardial infarction).
• Ventricular dysfunction, a weakness in the ventricles, the heart’s major pumping chambers.
• Structural heart disease, such as problems with the heart valves or muscles (cardiomyopathy). Read the rest of this entry »

Fainting is a sudden loss of consciousness. It most often occurs when the blood pressure is too low (hypotension) and the heart does not pump a normal supply of oxygen to the brain. Typically, a faint lasts only a few seconds or minutes, and then the person regains consciousness.

The medical term for fainting is syncope (SIN koe pee). It is a common problem that affects one million people in the U.S. every year. About one-third of us will faint at least once during our lifetime. A single fainting spell usually is not serious. It may be explained by factors such as stress, grief, overheating, dehydration, exhaustion or illness. Profound blood loss or fluid loss (severe diarrhea) may also cause syncope. Read the rest of this entry »

Heart Block is a type of bradycardia (too-slow heartbeat) that also is called atrioventricular, or AV block. In this condition, the electrical signals that stimulate heart muscle contractions are partially or totally blocked between the upper chambers (atria) and the lower chambers (ventricles). Read the rest of this entry »

Long QT Syndrome (LQTS) is a disorder of the heart’s electrical system, in which the heart muscle cells take longer than normal to recover electrically after each beat. There are two types of LQTS: Read the rest of this entry »