Healthy for life: Heart attack prevention

If you have cardiovascular disease, you’ll want to know about this serious health situation.

1. What is a heart attack?
2. What are the symptoms of a heart attack?
3. What should I do if I’m experiencing the symptoms of a heart attack?
4. How is a heart attack diagnosed?
5. How is a heart attack treated?
6. What are the causes of a heart attack?
7. What are the risk factors for a heart attack?
8. How do I prevent a heart attack?
9. How can health insurance help if I have a heart attack?
10. How can critical illness insurance help if I have a heart attack?

Your heart is one of the most important organs in your body. So, keeping your ticker in working order is one of the best ways to stay healthy. And when the heart isn’t working properly, it can cause a lot of trouble.

Case in point: Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the United States. And one of heart disease’s most serious events is a heart attack. In fact, someone has a heart attack approximately every 40 seconds in the United States.

But heart attack-related deaths have been dropping in recent decades, thanks to improvements in prevention options and advances in medicine. Recognizing the symptoms of a heart attack and getting immediate treatment can be lifesaving — and help keep your heart healthier afterward.

Let’s take a closer look at heart attacks, including risk factors and strategies for improving your heart health.

A critical illness insurance plan could help with an eligible illness, like a heart attack. Call a licensed insurance agent at (800) 827-9990 to talk about plans, or browse your options online today.

What is a heart attack?

A heart attack, also called myocardial infarction, occurs when the flow of blood that brings oxygen to a part of the heart muscle is suddenly severely reduced or completely blocked. Depriving the heart muscle of oxygen damages it, and the affected muscle can die. The longer the blockage lasts, the greater the damage.

A heart attack is not the same as cardiac arrest, which is when the heart suddenly stops beating or beats so fast that it stops pumping blood. However, a heart attack can cause cardiac arrest.

What are the symptoms of a heart attack?

The symptoms of a heart attack can sometimes be difficult to notice. In some cases, you may have one or more symptoms, and in other ones, you may have no symptoms at all. In fact, about 170,000heart attacks every year are “silent” — your heart can be damaged without you even realizing it.

Some heart attacks are sudden, while others may start more subtly and slowly. Symptoms may come and go. Here are some of the most common symptoms of a heart attack:

• Chest pain or discomfort. Chest pain felt in the center or left side of the chest is the most common symptom of a heart attack. The discomfort may feel like heaviness, fullness, squeezing or pressure. You may feel like you have heartburn or indigestion.
• Pain or discomfort elsewhere in the body. You may feel “pain or discomfort in one or both arms,” your back, shoulders, neck, jaw or above your belly button.
• Shortness of breath. You may feel like you can’t breathe even though you’re resting or not doing much physical activity. This symptom is more common in older adults.
• Lightheadedness, faintness or sudden dizziness. This symptom is more common in women.
• Unexplained sweating. You may break out in a cold sweat even though you’re not being active.
• Extreme tiredness. Unusual or unexplained fatigue may last for days. This symptom is more common in women.
• Nausea and vomiting. This symptom is more common in women.

What should I do if I’m experiencing the symptoms of a heart attack?

If you think you or someone you know may be having a heart attack, don’t hesitate to call 911. This is a situation where minutes could matter. Even if you’re unsure, it’s better to get it checked out.

It’s not a good idea to drive yourself or have someone else drive you to the hospital. An emergency medical services team that comes to you can start treatment right away, communicate with the hospital, and get you there quickly and safely.

How is a heart attack diagnosed?

An electrocardiogram (EKG) is the most common initial test when a heart attack is suspected. During an EKG, electrodes placed on your chest and limbs monitor your heart’s electrical activity. The test displays wave patterns that your doctor can interpret in diagnosing a heart attack.

The doctor will also do a physical exam, ask about your medical history, and may order more tests, such as:

• Blood tests: When you have a heart attack, some of the heart muscle dies and releases a protein that blood tests can detect.
• Imaging: A chest X-ray or a computed tomography (CT) scan give your doctor information about how your heart is functioning.
• Stress test: With a stress test, while hooked up to an EKG machine, you exercise, usually on a treadmill or stationary bike, to get your heart rate up. Alternatively, you may be given medicine to speed up your heart rate. The EKG captures your heart activity and gives your doctor information about how your heart functions when it’s working hard.

Interested in a critical illness insurance plan? Call a licensed insurance agent at (800) 827-9990 to talk about plans, or browse your options online today.

How is a heart attack treated?

If you have a heart attack, treatment to remove plaque or a blood clot from your coronary artery can limit damage to your heart and restore heart function. Treatments include:

• Medicines. Types of medicines include:
  • Thrombolytic medicines (clot busters) dissolve blood clots in your coronary arteries.
  • Nitroglycerine or nitrates improve blood flow through your coronary arteries.
  • Aspirin or other medications can “help prevent blood clots from forming.
• Oxygen therapy. You receive oxygen gas typically through tubes in your nose or a face mask.
• Procedures. Depending on what caused your heart attack, you may undergo noninvasive or surgical procedures such as:
  • Coronary angioplasty. This “improves blood flow to your heart” by opening up the area in the coronary artery where the blockage occurred. Also called percutaneous coronary intervention, this nonsurgical procedure involves threading a catheter into the coronary artery and inflating a balloon at its tip.
  • Stents. “A stent is a small mesh tube” used to hold open an area in the body. It may be inserted into a narrowed coronary artery during a minimally invasive procedure. The stent may have an outside layer that releases medicine over time to prevent the artery from narrowing again.
  • Heart bypass surgery. This is a surgical procedure that takes “healthy blood vessels from another part of the body and connects them to blood vessels above and below the blocked artery.” Heart bypass surgery is also called coronary artery bypass grafting.

What are the causes of a heart attack?

Coronary artery disease is the most common cause of heart attacks. It is also “the most common type of heart disease.”

Your coronary arteries carry blood and oxygen to your heart muscle. These arteries can narrow when a waxy, fatty substance called plaque builds up in them over time.

Plaque can break open and cause blood clots to form on its surface. A blood clot can block blood flow to parts of your heart muscle, causing a heart attack.

When coronary artery disease isn’t the cause of a heart attack, it’s called myocardial infarction in the absence of obstructive coronary artery disease (MINOCA). Causes of MINOCA include:

• Sudden and severe spasm of your coronary artery. A spasm (tightening) can block blood flow in the coronary artery, even when it doesn’t have a buildup of plaque. Smoking puts you at a higher risk of a spasm, especially if you’re exposed to extreme cold or high stress. Certain drugs, such as cocaine, can also cause a spasm.
• Coronary artery embolism. A blood clot can travel from elsewhere in your body and block your coronary artery, causing a heart attack. Conditions where you are already at risk of blood clots, such as pregnancy, increase your risk for a heart attack as well.
• Spontaneous coronary artery dissection (SCAD). Your coronary artery can tear and block your coronary artery, or a blood clot can form at the site of the tear, causing a heart attack. Conditions that put you at risk of SCAD include extreme physical activity and high stress.

What are the risk factors for a heart attack?

Some risk factors for a heart attack are things you can control, such as your level of physical activity, and others are things you can’t control, such as your age. Risk factors for a heart attack include:

Lifestyle habits

• An unhealthy diet, especially one that’s high in saturated fat, trans fats, cholesterol or sodium
• Lack of regular physical activity
• Smoking

Medical conditions

• High blood cholesterol
• High blood pressure
• High blood sugar or diabetes
• High blood triglycerides (a type of fat present in your blood)
• Being overweight and obese

Age and family history

• Age: The risk goes up for men age 45 and older, and for women age 55 and older.
• Family history of early heart disease: You have a higher risk if your father or a brother had a heart attack by age 55 or if your mother or a sister had a heart attack by age 65.

How do I prevent a heart attack?

The best way to prevent a heart attack is to do what you can to lower the risk factors that you can control. Examples include:

• Eat a healthy diet that’s low in sodium, saturated fats, trans fats and cholesterol.
• Get regular exercise. Aim for 150 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity, in addition to at least 2 days of muscle-strengthening activity, each week, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. If you don’t currently exercise, talk to your doctor about the best way to start slow and build your way up.
• Don’t smoke.
• Maintain a healthy weight.
• Limit your alcohol intake to 1 drink a day if you’re a woman or 2 drinks a day if you’re a man. (This decreases your risk of high blood pressure, a risk factor for heart disease.)
• See your doctor regularly to monitor for medical conditions that increase your risk, such as high blood pressure, high blood sugar or high cholesterol.
• Follow your treatment plan if you have a medical condition that puts you at a higher risk of heart disease, such as diabetes.

How can health insurance help if I have a heart attack?

Whether you’re healthy or have a long-term illness, such as heart disease, it’s a good idea to have health insurance. That’ll help when you need to see a doctor or get preventive care.

How can critical illness insurance help if I have a heart attack?

Critical illness insurance is a type of supplemental insurance that can help you with medical or out-of-pocket expenses in the event of a qualified illness like a heart attack. You pay extra for supplemental insurance, on top of your traditional health plan. It provides coverage or pays benefits that your traditional health insurance plan doesn’t. But it doesn’t take the place of your traditional health plan.

Critical illness insurance pays you a lump sum benefit to ease the burden if certain eligible health events occur, such as a heart attack. But it’s important to understand that you cannot purchase this type of insurance after you’ve already been diagnosed with an eligible condition, like a heart attack.

Having a heart attack may disrupt your finances. You may have higher-than-expected medical bills or reduced income while you recover. The benefit received from critical illness insurance may be used for medical or nonmedical expenses. Those might include:

• Childcare
• Health insurance deductibles
• Mortgage, rent and utility payments
• Out-of-pocket medical expenses, like copayments or coinsurance
• Prescription drugs and other medications
• Specialist treatment or rehabilitation

Whether you choose to get critical illness insurance is ultimately up to you. For example, someone who has a family history of heart disease may benefit from a critical illness plan. But again, it doesn’t take the place of traditional health insurance. You’ll want to get that before you start thinking about adding critical illness insurance.

Does your doctor think you may be at risk of having a heart attack? Call a licensed insurance agent at (800) 827-9990 to talk about plans, or browse your critical illness insurance options online today.

Disclaimer:
For informational purposes only. This information is compiled by HealthMarkets Insurance Agency and does not diagnose problems or recommend specific treatment. Services and medical technologies referenced herein may not be covered under your plan. Please consult directly with your primary care physician if you need medical advice.