Many people over the age of 45 begin to feel pain in the heart area. This symptom puts a person in a state of panic, because it is not known what exactly causes this condition.
Often, thoughts come to mind that serious heart problems have begun and the urgent help of cardiologists may be needed. After doing a cardiogram and getting a completely satisfactory result, a person's confusion only increases.
What can cause pain in the heart? And most importantly, what to do in such a situation? The answer is actually simple, although not everyone knows the answer. Heart pain often occurs due to other diseases. This situation occurs especially with thoracic osteochondrosis. Is it worth paying attention to the pain of this nature?
What does osteochondrosis look like?
The mechanism is quite simple. A person engages in certain physical activity throughout his life. Most of them "lie" in the spine. To make it easier for the vertebrae to cope with the tasks assigned to it, there are intervertebral discs between them. The latter, in turn, acts as a shock absorber, preventing the vertebrae from rubbing against each other.
Intervertebral discs wear out. The main reason is excessive stress on the spine. Malnutrition of cartilage tissue can also lead to their gradual destruction.
Microcracks form on the surface of the cartilage, tissues are destroyed, and as a result of this process, the vertebrae begin to touch. As a result of friction, an inflammatory process occurs, which is quite painful.
With thoracic osteochondrosis, active wear of intervertebral discs occurs in the thoracic spine. As a result of pathology, the patient not only loses endurance, he can no longer perform the same amount of physical activity. He begins to suffer from pain, which is getting worse every time.
Special treatment is required to alleviate the patient's condition. If the therapeutic course is not carried out on time, the patient may face a number of health problems. In particular, various pathologies of the heart system may occur.
The main symptoms of osteochondrosis
There are certain signs that will help to identify thoracic osteochondrosis against the background of other diseases.
- First of all, it is worth understanding where exactly the source of pain is. With thoracic osteochondrosis, the pain comes mainly from the chest. It can be sharp, as if squeezed from all sides. Often with coughing, there is a feeling of difficulty breathing and even shortness of breath. Sometimes the pain spreads to the region of the shoulder blades with a dull aching sensation. Unpleasant pain can be "rolled" after physical exercise, but also felt after sitting in an uncomfortable position;
- Sometimes thoracic osteochondrosis can appear in the form of numbness in the arms, legs, shoulders and neck. Often the limbs freeze even in the summer, for no reason;
- Headache and dizziness occur from time to time.
These are the main symptoms of thoracic osteochondrosis that you should pay attention to. All these painful conditions are the result of compression of blood vessels between the affected vertebrae due to thoracic osteochondrosis. All these symptoms are believed to be more pronounced in women.
In addition to these three main symptoms, it makes sense to pay attention to the dorsalgia that appears.This is a mild pain syndrome that occurs in the region of the damaged vertebra.
These pains are not severe, but sometimes cause a feeling of muscle stiffness. In this case, there is a feeling that the source of pain is in the stomach, liver or pancreas. In fact, this is a false feeling. Thoracic osteochondrosis has nothing to do with digestive organs.
Sometimes thoracic osteochondrosis develops in parallel with the cervical form. Then it is quite possible to feel a lump in the throat, especially after physical activity.
What are the differences between osteochondrosis and heart pain?
How to distinguish thoracic osteochondrosis from heart diseases if the symptoms are very similar in many ways? There are a number of signs that you should pay special attention to.
Nature of pain
First of all, it is necessary to try to analyze the nature of the pain. Many heart diseases also begin with discomfort in the heart area. With osteochondrosis, the pain is compressed.
At the same time, it either grows or recedes, but often does not leave for a long time and is stable. The pulse often increases, which is even more wrong. Sometimes there is a feeling of warmth inside the sternum.
A patient with cervicothoracic osteochondrosis often complains of pain in the lower cervical vertebrae. Sometimes the weakness of the muscles of the left hand is noted, the use of the little finger is especially problematic. The movement of the arms does not bring relief, it only increases the pain.
Sometimes the painful sensation spreads to the left quadrant of the body, not only the chest, but also the neck, left arm, and sometimes the face. This condition can last quite a long time, from several hours to several days.
The onset of angina and some pain sensations with a heart attack may be similar in nature. The main difference is the intensification of pain when breathing with osteochondrosis. A tablet of a venodilator or a vasodilator from the group of nitrates will relieve pain caused by heart problems. This method will not help against osteochondrosis in any way.
However, when the anesthetic solution is injected into the VI, VII cervical vertebrae and I thoracic vertebrae, the pain disappears. If distilled water is used instead of anesthesia, a slight tingling sensation occurs in the chest area. This is a clear sign that the cause of the pain is thoracic osteochondrosis.
Duration of pain
This sign also requires further consideration. If you have a problem with the heart, the pain in its area does not last long, usually a few minutes. The painful feeling caused by thoracic osteochondrosis can last for several days.
But there is a trap here: if the pain does not go away for several days and there is obvious weakness in the whole body, immediately consult a doctor.
It is quite possible that the cause of the malfunction was an acute myocardial infarction.
Location of pain
The location of the pain is equally important. In case of heart diseases, the source of pain is concentrated on the left side of the chest, sometimes the pain spreads to the neck, back of the head and shoulder area. Pain syndrome during osteochondrosis affects the thoracic, lumbar and cervical spine.
Associated symptoms
Pay attention to accompanying symptoms. Heart pain in most cases does not go away without an increase in heart rate and breathing. Sometimes the veins in the neck can become swollen, for example, with pericarditis.
With osteochondrosis, such a symptom is not observed, but general stiffness in movements can be well seen.
Why does tachycardia and arrhythmia occur in osteochondrosis?
Arrhythmia is perhaps the most common consequence of uncontrolled thoracic osteochondrosis. With this disease, compression of the artery along the entire spine often occurs.
Compression can occur from both bone growths and hypertonic muscles. As a result, the pressure inside the veins increases. The body needs more effort to "push" the blood through the loop. Against the background of this phenomenon, the heart rate increases.
Arrhythmia can manifest itself in different ways. Alternatively, it may result in sinus tachycardia. But how to find out what exactly causes tachycardia - heart disease or thoracic osteochondrosis?
- Tachycardia with problems with the spine is a constant phenomenon. The number of beats is about 90 per minute. It is observed even in a state of complete rest, and in diseases of the heart system, a rapid heartbeat occurs with increased physical activity;
- When a person takes an uncomfortable position, the heart rate may increase, especially if the spine receives more stress at this moment;
- Tachycardia with osteochondrosis maintains a certain rhythm, the interval between contractions does not change, it is always the same;
- As soon as targeted treatment of osteochondrosis begins, tachycardia begins to disappear, the problem disappears by itself.
If a symptom such as tachycardia remains uncontrolled and treatment is not started in time, the heart muscle cannot cope with the increased load.
As a result of such neglect, extrasystole can develop.
Extrasystole due to thoracic osteochondrosis?
This disease can occur by bypassing tachycardia. It occurs less often than tachycardia and occurs in advanced forms of osteochondrosis. The disease is also the result of an abnormal heart rhythm. It is caused by a prematurely accelerated contraction of the heart muscle, which immediately follows the normal one.
One may not feel bad at all. Sometimes you may feel that your heart stops for a moment or, on the contrary, accelerates. In this case, a very weak pulse is noted. This may not be followed at all.
If you do not pay attention to these symptoms in time, it is likely that chronic myocardial hypoxia will develop - this is one of the most serious diseases characterized by insufficient saturation of the heart muscle with oxygen. And this is already fraught with more serious problems.
For example, insufficient oxygen supply to the brain, which will cause a number of serious disturbances in the work of the central nervous system.
The first signs of extrasystole are observed only during physical activity. At rest, the heart rate normalizes on its own. What are the signs of extrasystole in osteochondrosis?
- rapid heartbeat with barely readable pulse;
- The muscles between the shoulder blades are constantly tense;
- A person often feels weak head, weakness and dizziness;
- Often there is a feeling of increased heat, sweating increases;
- It does not leave a feeling of inner anxiety;
- The increase in heart rate occurs periodically, is unstable and works on the wave principle - sometimes it increases, sometimes it almost dies;
- The volume of extrasystolic ejection exceeds the norm - this indicator can be determined using a tonometer.
These symptoms can be felt constantly, but often intensify at night or when the patient is in a horizontal position. Elementary movements of the limbs aggravate the symptoms.
This feeling can last for several hours. All attempts to stabilize the heart by taking cardiac drugs are unsuccessful. Attempting to determine the causes of heart diseases through ECG also does not answer the question.
There is no doubt that attempts to administer anesthesia between the VI and VII vertebrae of the cervical spine and the I thoracic vertebra have been successful. In this case, the cause of heart disease was precisely thoracic osteochondrosis.
Heart pain also increases when trying to palpate the thoracic vertebrae.
As a result, hypertension
Very often, thoracic osteochondrosis goes together with high blood pressure. The cause of this duet is compression of the vertebral artery. This can occur due to muscle spasm, resulting in significant swelling of the muscle tissue. The cause of compression of the artery can also be the displacement of the vertebra - such a violation also occurs with thoracic osteochondrosis.
For a simple reason, the vertebral artery, which is responsible for supplying the brain with oxygen and other useful components, lacks the necessary substances for its normal functioning. Brain cells are starving.
In order to supply the brain with the necessary amount of nutrients and "push" blood flow out of the loop, the body is forced to increase the speed of blood flow. With this mode of operation, the body automatically starts releasing substances that help increase blood pressure.
This allows the brain to be properly nourished, but causes hypertension.
If you do not draw a parallel between osteochondrosis and high blood pressure and start treating hypertension as an independent phenomenon, it is unlikely that such treatment will give a long-term sustainable result. Such experiences can only aggravate the situation, add additional problems in the work of the cardiovascular system.
How to determine hypertension caused by osteochondrosis?
- Periodically, the patient experiences dizziness, most often at moments of overwork;
- Due to frequent sleepiness, insufficient oxygen supply to the brain, the body tries to "save" nutrients to keep the vital organs in working order. The sleep state helps to save energy;
- Constant weakness is also the result of the brain not receiving enough oxygen;
- Anxiety, confusion;
- The appearance of "floaters" in front of the eyes - this symptom is often noted by people with high blood pressure, who do not know that the cause of this pressure is probably not in the bad condition of the blood vessels, but in osteochondrosis;
- Periodically, all objects begin to see double;
- Deterioration of vision often occurs, the reasons are the same - low oxygen;
- Hearing impairment;
- Fainting may occur with significant oxygen starvation - this is the body's protective reaction.
Diagnostics
It is good to know the symptoms of diseases, but the most accurate diagnosis can only be made by a doctor who uses modern diagnostic tools. The simplest and most convenient way is to conduct an ECG. This study will allow you to quickly determine whether the cause of pain in the heart region is a malfunction of the cardiovascular system or whether this disease is another pathology.
If the ECG confirms that the heart is working properly, it makes sense to order an MRI. This method allows you to get a layered image of the entire spine or its parts. These images will allow you to quickly and accurately determine whether a person has a problem with the spine.
If suspicions of osteochondrosis are confirmed, treatment should be started immediately.