Health

Leading Cardiologist Shares 10 Heart Symptoms People Should Never Ignore But Often Do

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According to a leading cardiologist, there are 10 top heart symptoms that people should never ignore when it comes to poor heart health, some of which include nausea, chest aches and feeling tired when you wake up. However, in a recent study, at least 54% of adults wouldn’t be able to guess that these symptoms were actually related to poor heart health.

As for the consultant cardiologist at Spire Bushey Hospital in North London, Dr. Ameet Bakhai, explained that there are other signs that may also indicate that you could have issues with your heart. These are feeling shortness of breath when you walk up a flight of stairs, heaviness in the arm upon exertion, and missed or frequently felt extra heartbeats.

Moreover, other indicators that your heart is not adapting well to particular positions include difficulty in both bending down and standing up, swollen legs, feeling dizzy when standing up too fast and retaining additional fluid in the body enough to require medical attention.

It was found that half of at least 2,000 British adults who took the survey reported that they have experienced these symptoms at least once before.

According to Dr. Bakhai, whose special interests include how lifestyle factors may impact one’s cardiac health, explain that for an adult with a healthy heart, they should be able to run up at least two flights of stairs without running out of breath and squat on a toilet, for as long as they have no other health issues. In addition, healthy adults should also be able to easily hold their breath for at least 20 seconds.

As for Dr. Bakhai, who has been advising the company that commissioned the poll about their Love Your Heart Supplements in the United Kingdom, Healthspan, said, “We often ignore our heart health and its signals until it’s too late.”

“There’s no annual measurements, observations or tests (MOT) to be passed for most of us, so we ignore the small signals that our own engine is not performing ideally. Heart issues can often get progressively worse, until one day you have a more complicated issue – that could have been avoided if you’d heeded the warning signs,” said Dr. Bakhai.

“Heart issues can be connected to other things – you might consider not being able to run up two flights of stairs more of a lung condition or a lack of fitness or of weight gain, but there is a lot of overlap with coronary artery disease or heart valve problems or irregular heart rhythms,” he added.

This is why looking after your heart health is crucial to your overall health.

The poll also discovered that at least one in five adults reported that they felt dizzy after standing up too quickly, while another 11% experienced chest tightness.

However, a third believe that these symptoms may also be from a variety of things, while 26% weren’t believed to be as serious. Moreover, 17% didn’t have the same issues as the other individuals since they didn’t want to be thought of as overly melodramatic, but 13% did consider themselves just too young to have heart problems.

For Dr. Bakhai, “This is sadly a misunderstanding as heart disease can affect people of all ages, particularly in the era of COVID, as the virus can attack the heart lining as a condition called myopericarditis (inflamed heart and heart covering).”

“Warning signs like chest tightness, aches in your arms or jaw, dizziness on standing, breathlessness with bending down should act like a wake-up call that your heart is calling out for help,” he said.

Meanwhile, one-fourth of those that were polled shared that they had medical conditions, like high blood pressure. Another 20% said they had high cholesterol. Furthermore, 72% of those that took the OnePoll never bothered to even see a medical professional about health issues, even though 68% of them do consider heart health to be very important to them. This number rose to 80% for those participants aged 65 and older. But, around half of the participants shared that they believe they need to do more to keep their hearts in better working condition.

Below are the 10 Heart Health Symptoms people should watch out for:

Shortness of breath
Dizziness on standing up quickly
Difficulty bending down
Tightness of the chest
Palpitations
Chest discomfort (excluding tightness)
Swollen legs
Difficulty standing up
Frequent extra or skipped heartbeats
Arm pain – often on the left

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