On the Road of Life, Your Heart is an Engine
By Dr. Deepak Kapoor, interventional cardiologist
MCG Health System

Augusta, Ga. -- On the road of life, your body is a finely tuned car and your heart is the engine.

And like any engine, as your heart becomes older, it becomes subject to wear and tear. Think of your arteries as your gas pipes and your blood supply as the gasoline. Aging, smoking and certain conditions like high blood pressure, diabetes and high cholesterol can cause the pipes that feed your heart to grow rusty and become blocked.

The heart is an amazing thing, able to function normally even when up to 50 percent of an artery is blocked. But when more than 50 percent is blocked, any physical exertion-walking, climbing stairs, even chasing after your child--can leave you exhausted and short of breath. And for more than 6 million Americans, such blockages can lead to chest pain, also known as angina.

Angina is described as pain, pressure or discomfort caused when the heart is not getting enough oxygen-rich blood to feed itself and the rest of the body. Other symptoms might include a squeezing or crushing pressure behind the breastbone, or in the shoulders, arms, back, neck or jaw; lightheadedness; and an abnormally fast or irregular heartbeat. If left untreated, the condition could lead to a heart attack, irregular heart rhythms and weakening of the heart.

Those with mild angina can usually treat symptoms through medications that increase the supply of oxygen to the heart or that help ease the heart's workload. In addition, lifestyle changes are recommended:

· If you have a medical history of heart disease in your family, monitor symptoms carefully and contact a physician if they become worse.
· Stick to a heart-healthy diet, get regular exercise so that you can maintain a healthy weight, and take steps to lower cholesterol.
· Maintain control of diabetes and blood pressure.
· Quit (or don't start) smoking.
· Manage stress and seek help for depression, both of which can aggravate blood pressure and cause weight to fluctuate.

For those who have significant blockage, i.e. more than 70 percent narrowing of an artery, other treatments may be needed. Angioplasty involves inserting a balloon into the obstructed artery to get rid of the plaque and allow blood to flow freely again. Many times, a stent-a stainless steel tube of wire mesh-is left to hold the walls of the artery open.

A recent innovation are drug-eluting stents, which are coated with medications to prevent the rebuild-up of plaque. Blockages used to return in up to 35 percent of patients who received angioplasty, necessitating additional procedures. The new stents have reduced that incidence to 5 percent.

As with a good car, taking care of your body can help prevent problems down the road. If you are experiencing chest pain and shortness of breath, don't hesitate to contact your physician to get a checkup.

MCG Health System is composed of MCG Health, Inc. and the clinical services offered by the faculty of the Medical College of Georgia and the members of the Physicians Practice Group. MCG Health, Inc. is a not-for-profit corporation operating the MCG Medical Center, Children's Medical Center, the Georgia Radiation Therapy Center and related clinical facilities and services. MCG Health, Inc. was formed to support the research and education mission of the Medical College of Georgia and to build the economic growth of the CSRA, the state of Georgia and the Southeast by offering the highest level of primary and specialty health care. For more information, please visit www.mcghealth.org.

Note to editors: Dr. Deepak Kapoor is Associate Director of the Cardiac Catherization Lab at MCG Health System. He has participated in clinical trials involving drug-eluting stents.