Angina is chest pain caused by the area of your heart muscle not getting enough oxygen-rich blood.
Angina is often experienced a s pain in the chest.
That pain can feel like a squeezing pressure, a tightness or a burning sensation in the chest and can range from quite mild symptoms to the feeling that someone has put your heat in a vice and is slowly crushing it or it may feel like a stabbing pain or numbness.
The cause of this is a reduction of oxygen rich blood reaching the heart due to some blockage of the arteries that deliver the blood.
It is a sign of coronary heart disease but it is different from a heart attack.
Where a heart attack is likely to cause permanent damage to your heart muscle an angina attack is not.
It is an indicator that there is a problem though and it is critical that you take some action to improve your situation before a heart attack or a stoke eventuates.
Recognising an angina attack and distinguishing it from a heart attack is normally not terribly difficult.
The pain of an angina attack is normally centred on the heart with a pain that ranges through levels that: ocould be as mind as a feeling of indigestion or gas, ocould be specific to the heart area, ocould be area of the chest but not in the immediate heart area, ocould be pain in your neck, throat or even in your arms ocould feel like you are choking and make your arms feel like they are dead weights.
The effects of angina will normally subside within a few minutes, 3 to 5.
They should definitely not last any more than 10 min.
If you have symptoms lasting 20 min you are probably having a heart attack, not an angina attack, and need to seek medical support immediately.
Other Symptoms that may be associated with angina are: osweating, onausea, ovomiting, oanxiety, oshortness of breath, oringing in the ears, oloss of speech, odizziness, ofainting.
One trait of angina is that it is normally predictable.
It tends to occur under the same conditions each time.
oVery often an angina attack is associated with exercise, particularly aerobic exercise or even just walking, especially after a meal.
oStress or emotional anxiety.
oSmoking.
oEating heavy meals.
oExposure to very hot or cold temperatures.
If you experience symptoms of angina then get medical attention immediately.
If the symptoms are leading to a heart attack then medical attention may prevent the attack.
In a case where there is a heart attack then medical attention may significantly reduce the damage to the heart muscle that the attack causes.
Once you are stable then take the warning of the angina attack seriously and look into the options you have to reduce your risk of further attacks.
You can give thanks for the problem you have had because for 40% of people who die from fatal heart attacks, the first sing that there is a problem is the attack that kills them.
In your case you have had a warning so you can investigate options to avoid further attacks and ways to improve your cardiovascular health so that you can go on to live a normal, healthy, life.