Heart Diseases
Heart diseases include various conditions that affect the structure and function of the heart. While some occur as birth defects, others can develop by following an unhealthy lifestyle. Some of the common heart diseases and abnormalities include:
- Atherosclerosis: formation of clot in blood vessels
- Aneurysm: abnormal bulging of the blood vessels
- Coronary artery disease (CAD): hardening of the arteries that supply oxygen and nutrients to the heart muscles
- Heart attack (myocardial infarction): damage to heart muscles due to blockage of blood vessels supplying it
- Stroke: reduced or lack of blood flow to the brain
- High blood pressure (hypertension): excessive pressure against the walls of the arteries causing the heart to pump harder
- Arrhythmia: irregular beating of the heart
- Atrial fibrillation: irregular and rapid beating of the heart
- Mitral valve prolapses: leaky mitral valve (flaps of skin that control the one-way direction of blood flow from left aorta to left ventricle)
- Aortic stenosis: narrowed opening of the aortic valve (valve between the heart and the main vessel supplying blood to the body)
- Mitral insufficiency or mitral regurgitation: mitral valve does not close tightly
- Congenital heart disease: abnormalities in the structure of the heart, such as defects in the valves (atresia), wall separating the heart chambers (atrial and ventricular septal defect) and heart muscles (cardiac hypertrophy), that develop at birth
- Cardiomyopathy: abnormal thickening, enlargement, and/or stiffening of heart, which weakens the heart muscles
- Pericarditis: infection and inflammation of the heart’s lining
