Forgive a stupid question, but I thought arteries are “downstream” of the heart and the veins carry the deoxygenated blood to the heart thereby being “upstream.”
You are correct. The arteries at issue in a heart attack are the ones that supply the heart tissue itself with blood flow. The origins of those arteries are just a smidge outside of the heart, so immediately after being pumped out of the heart some blood gets diverted off into these arteries to feed the heart muscle.
My father had a serious heart attack the night before Easter, about thirty years ago. What he felt was a bad backache. He started doing toe touches to flex his back, and the pain went away for a while. Then it came back and he started sweating badly. Mom, an RN, threw a robe on him and dragged him out the door to the car. She didn’t want to wait for the amublance, and at 11:00PM there was little traffic. Mom said she didn’t pay a lot of attention to traffic lights.
I stayed home and called the hospital, giving them the heads up he was on the way. They ripped him out of the car and someone parked it.
He said except for the backache he didn’t have all that much pain. But two weeks later he had a double bypass.
I was able to stay calm when calling, because it hadn’t been “dramatic”, like on TV or in the movies.
Just keep in mind that pulmonary arteries carry de-oxygenated blood (from heart to lungs) and pulmonary veins carry oxygenated blood (from lungs back to heart). So, the “artery = oxygenated” is only true for non-pulmonary vessels.
I remember in when my brother was 28 and was having severe chest pains and other classic symptoms. On Christmas eve and Christmas day. I remember my mother talking to our family doc, who said “I know what you’re thinking, and forget it. It’s not a heart attack.”
Only, it was. He eventually got to the point where he said it felt like an elephant was sitting on his chest and something had to be done, so I drove him to the hospital. It took a while for the cardiologist on call to arrive, but they put him on a brand new high-tech drug from Genentech, which probably saved his life and limited the damage to 10% loss of heart muscle.
Not to contradict the point that it takes more than the mentioned symptoms to diagnose a heart attack, just to point out how silly it is to rule it out with insufficient information, or the assumption that healthy youths who aren’t doing coke don’t have them.
My brother had a massive heart attack earlier this year. He says he remembers nothing from the day before until about 2 days after, not how he felt or anything. He actually arrested in the ER, where his wife had driven him.
Well sure, that’s why I included history, just like you did.
I’ve witnessed three heart attacks. One my dad’s, two my own, three a friends.
My dad just dropped. Period. There was a period of sounds coming from his mouth,
but I knew he was gone. R.I.P. Dad.
Mine: I was vacuuming when my heart started to beat very fast. I was sweating, (left arm had been hurting for a few days before) & scared (Of course).
I called 911 and was taken to the hospital where I received a quintuple bypass. (The docs said there would have been more but couldn’t keep me under any more. (5 hrs.)
This was 15 years ago, now I’m doing fine.
The third was a friend who dropped unexpectedly, told me he was feeling a tightness in his chest. He went back to work and fell, this time for the last time.
I hope this helps you answer your question.