Precautions for patients with myocardial infarction

  Case sharing: Mr. Xu, 39, had a sudden onset of chest pain, but he did not care. It was not until half a month later that the symptoms did not ease, and he also experienced dizziness, false sweating and weakness, which led to his family being sent to the hospital.  Mr. Xu told the doctor that he had an impressive chest pain two years ago, which was accompanied by cold sweat, but the chest pain was intermittent and slowly relieved after two days. Coupled with his youth at the time, he thought it was no big deal and didn’t see a doctor. On this visit, the doctor combined the ECG and other test results to make a diagnosis: Mr. Xu had a myocardial infarction and cardiogenic shock. Because the emergency angiography found that two coronary vessels of Mr. Xu were completely occluded, it was confirmed that he had two heart attacks.  Clinically, many people do not pay attention when they have chest pain and miss the best time for heart attack treatment. This case reminds us of the following points: First, once chest pain occurs, you should go to the hospital promptly. The benefit of doing so is that once a myocardial infarction is diagnosed, the occluded blood vessel can be opened in time to save the maximum amount of heart muscle. After the diagnosis is clear, secondary prevention treatment of coronary heart disease can be obtained under the guidance of doctors, which can prevent the reoccurrence of heart attack.  Secondly, Mr. Xu in the case had three fatal “carelessness”: firstly, he did not consult a doctor at the first time when he had chest pain 2 years ago, and missed the emergency opening of the occluded blood vessel of infarction; secondly, he did not consult a doctor after the first heart attack, and missed the opportunity of regular secondary prevention treatment of coronary heart disease, which also laid the foundation for another heart attack; lastly, he did not consult a doctor after the first heart attack, and missed the opportunity of regular secondary prevention treatment of coronary heart disease. Finally, when myocardial infarction occurred again, there was still no timely medical consultation, which again wasted a golden rescue time, and the second infarction increased the area of myocardial necrosis, as a result of which cardiogenic shock occurred. Once myocardial infarction is combined with cardiogenic shock, the mortality rate is extremely high.