- January 22, 2025
Heart and cardiovascular diseases belong to the group of diseases that are extremely dangerous for our lives. Improperly treated or detected too late, unfortunately, very often lead to the death of the patient. Their diagnostics is therefore extremely important. Cardiovascular diseases are associated with the occurrence of characteristic symptoms, which cannot be underestimated under any circumstances.
In some cases, symptoms may appear suddenly, in others they may build up gradually, even over several years (for example, chronic ischemic heart disease). In addition, diagnostics takes into account the results of tests (including ECG, magnetic resonance, holter test), which allow you to confirm or exclude particular types of heart disease. The most common are heart failure, ischemic heart disease, myocarditis, hypertension and arrhythmias. What are the symptoms and causes of the most common cardiovascular diseases?
Cardiovascular failure and related diseases are the result of a variety of factors common to all heart and vascular diseases, which often occur at the same time, thus increasing the patient's risk of developing the disease. These include: gender (men struggle with cardiovascular diseases much more often than women), age (the risk of developing the disease increases with the age of the patient), genetic burden, overweight and obesity, unhealthy lifestyle, smoking, excessive stress.
These causes of cardiovascular diseases are directly related to the risk of each of them, and their elimination plays a key role in the prevention of this type of diseases. Preventing their development, apart from limiting risk factors, also concerns a proper and balanced diet, healthy active lifestyle, as well as supporting the heart's work by providing the body with vitamins and nutrients supporting its proper functioning, for example in the form of dietary supplements.
Symptoms of individual heart diseases, although they may be similar, may vary in scope and severity depending on the type of disease. Symptoms of heart failure, consisting in pumping insufficient amount of blood to individual organs and parts of the body, are mainly swelling resulting from the accumulation and retention of water in the body, dyspnoea and the feeling of fatigue accompanying even a small physical effort. Arterial hypertension is also manifested by shortness of breath and a feeling of fatigue. In addition, the patient experiences severe headaches, heart palpitations, tinnitus, dizziness, insomnia and a tendency to explosive behaviour.
Symptoms of ischemic heart disease, also known as coronary heart disease, are mainly chest pain caused by stress or as a result of physical effort. Nausea and shortness of breath may occur. Heart arrhythmias are most often manifested by very dangerous for the patient's health and life abnormalities of cardiac spasms (rarity or tachycardia - ventricular and atrial fibrillation). Symptoms of myositis are: dyspnoea (at the initial stage of the disease occur only after exercise), chest pain, palpitations of the heart and acceleration of its work, swelling of the limbs, feeling of fatigue and general weakness.
Symptoms of cardiovascular diseases, such as excessive fatigue or swelling of the limbs, are often attributed to other diseases. Meanwhile, underestimating them can have very serious health consequences and even lead to death. Ischemic heart disease, rheumatic heart disease and many other cardiovascular diseases are still one of the most common causes of death. This is why it is important to prevent cardiovascular diseases, as mentioned above, by changing lifestyles and by regular preventive examinations, which allow for the rapid detection of possible abnormalities in the functioning of the heart and the entire cardiovascular system.
