Pain in the heart like needles. I have an acute pain in my heart: when to help myself, and when to urgently call an ambulance

Stitching pains in the area of the heart are often present. They are caused by cardiac diseases, spinal lesions, and pathologies of the respiratory system. To identify the causes of the symptom, a thorough examination is necessary. Many people are interested in if their heart hurts, what are the reasons, and what to do at home.

To determine the reasons why your heart is stabbing and understand what to do in such a situation, you need to assess the nature of the discomfort. To do this, pay attention to the following features:

If the severity of symptoms changes when changing body position, it is worth feeling the pectoral muscles and the spaces between the ribs. If there is spasm of the pectoral muscle or the development of intercostal neuralgia, it is possible to identify painful areas.

To establish the causes of a symptom, you should evaluate the strength and nature of the pain:

If a person has severe pain and describes in detail all the details of his condition, non-cardiac factors are most likely the cause. In such a situation, emergency measures are not needed.
When true symptoms appear, people describe their condition rather sparingly, but accurately. There are no unnecessary details.

The following manifestations indicate cardiac disorders:

Causes of tingling in the heart area

If there is a tingling sensation in the heart area, what could it be? Only a specialist can correctly diagnose an anomaly. The main causes of the symptom include the following:

Thus, the heart can hurt for cardiac and non-cardiological reasons. In the first case, the following features are observed:

the duration of the stabbing pain is more than a quarter of an hour;
the discomfort is burning and stabbing in nature;
pain increases with stress or exercise;
discomfort often radiates to the neck, jaw, left arm and shoulder blade; on the right, pain is felt very rarely.

If the cause lies in non-cardiological factors, the following features are observed:

Why does my heart pound when I inhale?

Usually the heart stabs when inhaling when respiratory problems occur. This sign is often caused by the occurrence of pneumothorax. The disease occurs against the background of complications of pathologies of the respiratory organs.

As a result, a kind of cushion is formed between the chest and lung tissues. This causes a feeling of tightness and acute pain when a person inhales air.

The development of pneumothorax is observed against the background of inflammation and chronic pathologies of lung tissue, tuberculosis. Other diseases can also cause it.

When blood clots form in the pulmonary vessels, there is a risk of developing embolism. This disease is characterized by an acute pain syndrome of a stabbing nature. It increases with strong breaths. This condition is characterized by rapid heartbeat and shortness of breath.

Important: The appearance of pain in the heart with the listed anomalies is observed in the center of the chest. Usually the symptom is present in a calm state.

The provoking factors of the disease also include non-cardiological factors. If pain is observed when inhaling, inaccurate movements, coughing and sneezing, this indicates intercostal neuralgia.

Acute pain syndrome indicates precordial syndrome. With strong inhalations, discomfort increases and can be present for up to 3 minutes. Also, provoking factors include traumatic injuries to the chest, diseases of the esophagus, and the development of osteochondrosis.

What to do: first aid, treatment

First of all, you need to determine why the tingling in the heart occurs. If it is difficult for a person to determine the area where pain is located, the following must be done:

If there is a sharp pain in the chest that lasts more than 5 minutes, a heart attack can be suspected. In such a situation, you need to act quickly. If acute and burning pain occurs, which is characterized by a feeling of heaviness and lack of air, you need to do the following:

call an ambulance;
free a person from oppressive objects;
measure pressure;
with high or normal blood pressure, you can give the patient a Nitroglycerin tablet - the substance is taken sublingually;
if systolic pressure is less than 100 mmHg. Art., the use of “Nitroglycerin” is prohibited - the drug can cause a decrease in blood pressure, which will aggravate the person’s condition;
give 300 mg of Aspirin - the patient must chew the drug.

Important: If a person loses consciousness and stops breathing, first aid should include cardiac massage and artificial respiration. If the patient's condition is stable and there is burning pain in the chest, he should not be left alone until the doctor arrives. Usually the patient is given an ECG and hospitalized in the cardiology department.

Drug treatment

To cope with stabbing sensations in the heart, the following medications are used:

Folk remedies

In addition to traditional medicines, folk remedies can be used. Before using such recipes, you should consult your doctor. It is especially important to do this during pregnancy. Also, during the treatment period, you should definitely give up coffee and alcohol.

Effective products include the following:

Thus, the question of whether the heart can pound should be answered in the affirmative. To cope with discomfort, you need to consult a doctor in a timely manner. The specialist will make an accurate diagnosis and select adequate therapy.

Sometimes many people may experience stabbing pain in the heart area. Moreover, it is quite difficult to answer unequivocally why the heart hurts sometimes. Often, in order to make an accurate diagnosis, you will have to undergo the necessary tests, undergo radiography, tomography and other types of diagnostics, only then can you determine why this phenomenon occurs. In some cases, in order to understand why the heart often hurts, it is enough to take a patient’s medical history.

Causes

First of all, let's try to figure out why a person's heart sometimes hurts? In fact, discomfort in the heart area can be caused by several reasons, and in order to better understand them, we will divide them into two categories.

The first category includes coronary heart disease, which can be at various stages of its development. Often with this disease, the myocardium suffers from a piston lack of oxygen, which causes a disorder of the coronary blood supply. In this case, colitis in the heart area in case of increased physical activity (fast walking, running, carrying and lifting heavy objects).

Very often, such pain in the heart area is stabbing in nature, in some cases it can radiate to other organs located in close proximity.

If you sometimes experience such unpleasant sensations, you can get rid of them by taking nitroglycerin. However, if this condition occurs frequently, it is not recommended to self-medicate, since such symptoms in the heart can sometimes cause myocardial infarction. And in this case, taking nitroglycerin alone will no longer help.

In the second category is cardiology, which becomes a consequence of negative processes occurring in the heart area: inflammatory diseases, defects, vegetative-vascular dystonia, congenital diseases and the rest. Most often, colitis in the heart area is caused by inflammation of the outer lining of the heart and myocardium, as well as as a result of cardiac romantic diseases.

In all the cases described above, a person feels that his heart is hurting for a long time, and the pain can also be aching in nature, increasing with coughing and taking a deep breath. You can reduce such sensations in the heart area by taking painkillers.

Sources of pain

In order to understand why the heart sometimes hurts, you should recognize the source of pain in the correct way. It is likely that the unpleasant sensations have nothing to do with the activity of the heart, but arise due to diseases of other organs. If you are wondering why colitis in the heart area, there are several reasons:

pericardial sac and heart (pericarditis);
the area of the diaphragm that separates the abdominal cavity and chest;
respiratory organs;
chest wall, including muscles, ribs and skin;
aorta;
digestive organs (esophagus, stomach);
the dorsal spine, its nerve endings and muscles.

What are the main causes of stabbing pain?

In order to understand why the heart hurts, it is necessary to carefully study the patient's medical history. Indeed, often, a lot of useful information is hidden in the patient’s answers: the duration of pain, their nature, as well as the frequency of occurrence. Just based on such information, the doctor will have the opportunity to make the most accurate conclusion about the presence of a particular heart disease.

Most often, when asked why the heart hurts, the answer should be that it is angina pectoris. This type of disease involves a narrowing of the blood vessels that supply oxygen to the heart of the human body. Angina is often accompanied by sweating, stabbing pain, shortness of breath, and a feeling of tightness in the cervical and thoracic region. These kinds of symptoms are often absent in women and older people. Therefore, it can be extremely difficult for patients in this category to make a diagnosis based on this history. More detailed research is required.

If you do not know why, in some cases, pain occurs in the heart area, and every day its intensity only intensifies, then it is likely that this is a sign of the onset of myocardial infarction. This disease is extremely serious and is characterized by blockage of one of the coronary arteries. During a myocardial attack, the sensation of pain becomes much stronger than during angina pectoris, and may include a number of atypical symptoms.

In any case, whether it is myocardial disease or angina pectoris, the patient is recommended to undergo a clinical examination to make an accurate diagnosis and prescribe appropriate treatment.

How to cope with pain in the first minutes?

If you know for sure that you have diseases associated specifically with the cardiovascular system, then in this case you need to act in accordance with the doctors’ instructions: take prescribed medications, perform the necessary procedures. In the same case, if such cases have not been observed before, then you just need to rest, after taking Valocordin, Valoserdin or Corvalol.

In addition, fresh air is highly desirable. People at risk should pay special attention to the appearance of stabbing pain and call an ambulance when the first symptoms appear. Before the doctors arrive, if possible, it is recommended to steam your legs and dissolve the Valocordin tablet.

What to do if your heart hurts sometimes?

If you notice the appearance of unpleasant stabbing pains in the heart area, you should determine the location of their origin by feeling it with your finger. If you were able to detect a source of localized pain, then with a high probability you can say that such pain is not “heart pain”, but is of a different nature. In this case, it will be enough to rest a little or perform a tonic massage. The actions described above should be carried out not for diagnosis and self-medication, but before the arrival of a doctor, who will definitely ask about your feelings. This will make it possible to prescribe the diagnostics you require.

After the doctor receives the information required from the patient, one of the types of diagnostics will be prescribed:

echocardiography, which allows you to determine the general condition of the heart valves and muscles;
electrocardiogram (ECG) with little physical activity and at rest, and also an ECG throughout the day;
ultrasound diagnostics to determine the speed of blood flow near the heart;
coronary angiography, used to study the condition of the coronary arteries;
phonocardiogram, which is used to detect heart murmurs.

In summing up

After the diagnosis has been made, the doctor will be able to prescribe the necessary treatment or report the absence of a disease of his profile, advising him to go to another doctor. Therefore, you should not carry out independent diagnosis and treatment on your own. It is for these purposes that there are qualified doctors who are distinguished by the availability of the necessary diagnostic equipment and special knowledge.

When acute pain occurs in the area of the heart, you need to try to determine whether it is pain in the heart or intercostal neuralgia. To do this, you need to take a deep breath and exhale. This must be done slowly at first, and then quickly. If the pain changes its character, it is not cardiac. If the pain is stable, there is a possibility that it is.

Pain in the heart can be caused by a sharp spasm caused by a narrowing of the vessel. Flow of blood into the heart. If this condition continues for more than 40 minutes, the heart muscle dies. In other words, myocardial infarction develops. Therefore, sharp pain in the heart requires an immediate call for an ambulance.

Myocardial infarction often develops against a background of anxiety or even panic. The most correct action in case of pain in the heart is to sit down, calm down and wait for the doctor to arrive. If you can’t calm down, you can drink 40 drops of Valocordin. This will help you cope with your emotions.

One of the most common reasons why people go to the doctor is the appearance of stabbing pain in the heart area. People protect this vital organ instinctively, so if the heart hurts, it always causes anxiety, even if the pain is not intense. The causes of stabbing pain in the heart area can be many factors, depending on which the nature of the pain that appears differs. With any disease, pain in the heart has its own individual characteristics.

The occurrence of stabbing pains may not be associated with the presence of diseases of the heart itself; they can be provoked by diseases of other organs: intercostal neuralgia, pathology of the costal cartilages. Increased pain in these diseases occurs when bending over, turning the body, or making sudden movements with the arms.

Patients with neurosis also note the appearance of pain in the heart area, which occurs in a short attack. Pain in the heart area can be caused by curvature of the spine or weakening of it in the thoracic region, or pinching of a nerve root.

TO common reasons why the heart hurts, relate:

myocardial infarction;
angina pectoris;
pericarditis;
development of pulmonary embolism;
cardiopsychoneurosis;
osteochondrosis

With myocardial infarction, pain appears suddenly, it cannot be endured, as a rule, the pain is predominantly localized behind the sternum. In most cases, recoil is felt in the forearm, lower jaw and neck. It is accompanied by fear of death, dizziness, shortness of breath, and cold sweat. Nausea and vomiting may occur, and loss of consciousness is possible. Usually the pain is intense and lasts more than 15 minutes.

With angina, pain also occurs suddenly due to the presence of atherosclerosis of the coronary arteries. The pain can be both weak and unbearable in nature and localized behind the sternum. The pain radiates to the shoulder blade, left shoulder, neck and lower jaw. The main difference from myocardial infarction is the duration of pain, which is less than 15 minutes, and stops if the person is at rest or takes nitroglycerin. Most often, such pain occurs during stress and physical activity; it may be systemic in nature, i.e. its occurrence occurs at certain hours.

In the case of pericarditis, pain is characterized by a number of features:

gradual onset;
increasing intensity over several hours;
projection on the left side of the chest and behind the sternum;
return to the right hypochondrium, neck and epigastrium;
increased when breathing, swallowing, changing body position;
subsiding when taking a position lying on the right side, with the legs pressed to the chest;
relief by taking painkillers;
accompanied by sweating, weakness, nausea and vomiting, hiccups.

In case of pulmonary embolism, it is important to determine not only the nature and location of pain, but also the presence of concomitant manifestations. This disease is characterized by the appearance of severe shortness of breath, cough and hemoptysis. The onset of pain occurs suddenly, with localization behind the sternum. It is accompanied by sweating, panic, and syncope.

In the event of neurocirculatory dystonia, the pain is predominantly localized in the left side of the chest, its duration can be several days. Stress, overwork, and anxiety predispose to pain. Pain may be accompanied by interruptions in heart function, shortness of breath, weakness and dizziness. If you take sedatives, the pain goes away.

With osteochondrosis, tingling sensations are felt in the heart area, which occurs in case of damage to the cervical and thoracic spine. There is increased pain when turning, moving, deep breathing, coughing. It is accompanied by pain in the limbs and back.

What to do if your heart hurts

In order to understand what to do if your heart hurts, you need to find out the reason that caused this phenomenon. The occurrence of stabbing pain in the heart area is usually associated with the presence of vegetative-vascular dystonia, which indicates the occurrence of disturbances in the functioning of the nervous system. This disease can be caused by frequent stress or a busy lifestyle.

First of all, if your heart hurts, you need to determine whether there is a relationship between pain and physical activity. If you feel a stabbing pain in your heart, you need to feel your chest and try to determine the presence of particularly painful areas. If any were found, then they are not related to the heart.

You should try to inhale deeply and check whether a stabbing sensation appears as you inhale. You need to check if the pain increases when turning your torso, try to change your position a little and observe if the pain disappears. If the answer to some of these points was positive, then the pain is not related to the heart.

Our expert - Candidate of Medical Sciences Anna Luchnikova.

Dangerous narrowing

The cause of angina (severe pain or discomfort in the chest, which is the leading symptom of coronary heart disease) is a narrowing of the blood vessels that supply the heart muscle. Usually this happens gradually and imperceptibly due to the formation of atherosclerotic plaques on them. Constriction of blood vessels “forces” the heart to work harder, because blood is pushed through them with difficulty.

A particularly dangerous situation occurs during physical activity. At this time, muscles, tissues and cells require more blood, the need of the heart itself for oxygen increases, but narrow vessels cannot deliver the required amount of blood and the heart begins to lack oxygen. This condition is called ischemia. The heart suffers and sends an SOS signal - pain occurs.

Because the pain usually begins with exercise, this type of angina has been called “exertional angina.” To indicate the severity of the disease, it was divided into four functional classes.

At first, angina can only be caused by extreme exertion, such as unusually fast, long walking or running. In this case, they talk about the lightest, first functional class. The most severe angina – class 4 – occurs with minimal physical activity (for example, after just a few steps) or even at rest.

However, this division is quite arbitrary. For a person suffering from angina, it is not the class of angina that is important, but the correct analysis of one’s own feelings. It is necessary not to miss the moment when the disease begins to progress. If earlier, for example, when going up the stairs, angina attacks occurred only after the third floor, but now - already on the second, you need to visit a doctor to change something in the treatment. It is better not to put it off for a long time, because the increase in angina pectoris can soon lead to myocardial infarction.

Toad on the chest

Typical angina attacks have their own distinctive features. In most cases, pain occurs when climbing stairs, walking, or carrying heavy objects. There may be unpleasant sensations even after an emotional outburst. Pain from angina pectoris is most often localized behind the sternum, that is, in the center of the chest. But it can also be on the left - as they say, “in the region of the heart,” or in the neck, lower jaw, between the shoulder blades. Usually the pain is pressing, squeezing, and sometimes burning. Some people say: “as if something heavy was placed on the chest.” Perhaps that is why in the past angina was called angina pectoris.

Such a heart attack usually passes quickly, usually within 10 minutes after stopping the exercise or taking a nitroglycerin tablet under the tongue. However, angina pectoris is insidious in that it does not always manifest itself this way. The diagnosis can be clarified after a thorough examination. This includes a regular ECG, daily cardiogram monitoring, and exercise tests, for example, on a bicycle ergometer or on a treadmill.

Pharmacological agents based on nitrates still remain the most reliable means for relieving angina attacks. In addition to tablets, to relieve an attack, you can use aerosols - liquid forms of the drug for spraying into the mouth.

Medicines from the nitrate group are basic for the treatment of angina pectoris. Their main effect is that they reduce blood flow to the heart and thereby relieve excess stress on it. This pharmacological group includes several dozen drugs. Some need to be taken 4 times a day due to their short duration of action (approximately 6-7 hours). Others are longer-acting, their activity in the body lasts 12–14 hours, and sometimes a day or more. The most modern products are used only once a day.

It is very convenient to use special patches. In this case, the medicine is gradually absorbed into the blood, creating reliable protection for the heart. There are even special tablets that are glued in the mouth to the mucous membrane of the cheek and gradually dissolve there.

And yet, everything related to taking nitrates is very important to agree with your doctor. They do not have many side effects, but, for example, people with some forms of glaucoma, as well as those taking drugs for erectile dysfunction, should use nitrates with caution. Often they cause nitrates and headache attacks, which can be relieved using other means.

In addition to nitrates, so-called calcium antagonists are used to prevent angina attacks. Another of the main drugs for people suffering from angina pectoris, and coronary heart disease in general, is aspirin in small doses. Research by American scientists has shown that 1/4 tablet per day prevents many terrible complications, such as heart attack and sudden death.

But here, too, not everything is simple. Especially when it comes to patients suffering from stomach ulcers. They need to take aspirin with food or plenty of liquid. Or opt for special dosage forms that practically do not damage the gastric mucosa. In any case, if you have angina, you must take any medications constantly, without stopping them even if you feel well.

If possible, you need to lead an active lifestyle, but observe moderation in everything.

And, of course, it’s good to always have close people nearby who will take on part of the necessary work, help you overcome difficulties, and provide assistance during an attack.

Important

If you have an attack

It is necessary to immediately stop all vigorous activity. Stop, or even better, sit down or lie down;

If after half a minute or a minute the pain persists, put a tablet under your tongue and wait until it dissolves. You can use drops and aerosols with nitrates. Some people prefer to chew the tablet. Since drugs in this group can cause headaches and slight dizziness, it is better to take them while in a horizontal position or reclining;

If the pain does not go away after 5 minutes, you need to take one or three more tablets - depending on the drug, you should discuss this issue with your doctor in advance.

If even then the pain persists, you should urgently call an ambulance.

Validol, Corvalol, Valocordin are not suitable for eliminating an attack of angina. Taking them will only waste your time.