All you need to know about Acute Heart Attack and Primary Angioplasty

1. What is Acute Heart Attack?
Sudden complete blockage of a major coronary artery supplying oxygen to the heart muscles is acute Heart Attack.

2. What are the symptoms of an acute Heart Attack?
  • Severe chest pain with sweating, palpitation and breathing difficulty.
  • Patient can also experience feeling of black out, sinking down, cold extremities.
  • Extreme lethargy particularly in diabetes patients.
  • The chest pain can radiate to either or both arms, jaw and to the back region.
  • The patient can also have severe vomiting or nausea with abdominal discomfort. 
3. What to do at home during Acute Heart Attack?
  • One should immediately call an ambulance to shift the patient to a nearby hospital with facilities for investigations and treatment like ECG, ECHO, and if required Angiogram, Primary Angioplasty for urgent relief of acute Heart Attack.
  • During transport to the nearby hospital, the patient should be given 325 MG dose of aspirin tablet to swallow if there is no history of active peptic ulcers. 
4. What is Primary Angioplasty?
It is a treatment option to open the blocked artery causing the acute heart attack within a maximum of 3 hours (earlier the better) by doing balloon Angioplasty with or without stenting. This is the best evidence based procedure to save maximum number of lives and prevent complications from an acute heart attack.

5. What is the follow-up treatment of acute Heart Attack after Primary Angioplasty?
The doctor will prescribe medication and follow up and most likely to advise as below
  • Anti-platelet drugs (Aspirin & Clopidogrel), and Statin for a period as suggested by the treating doctor.
  • Treatment and correction of all risk factors causing acute Heart Attack like diabetes, high blood pressure, high cholesterol levels, obesity and smoking.