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Causes and Symptoms of Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy and its Treatment Options


Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy is a type of heart disease in which there is thickening of heart muscle in the ventricles without any obvious cause that prevents the ticker from pumping effectively, and it can cause sudden cardiac death if left untreated. The muscle cells can also become disorganized with thickening of the heart muscle, or myocardium which can complicate the delivery of electrical signals through the muscle. The disease occurs equally in men and women and can affect people of all ages, including infants. Although it’s usually inherited, but can develop over time due to aging or high blood pressure. According to the American Heart Association, the condition affects up to 500,000 people in the United States and fewer than 10 percent of these cases are among children under age 12 years. It tends to develop during childhood or young adulthood with younger people likely to be having a more severe form of the condition. Furthermore, hypertrophic cardiomyopathy is the most common reason for sudden cardiac arrest in young people.


Causes and Symptoms:
Possible symptoms include chest pain when under stress, known as angina; shortness of breath, feeling of light-headedness or faint, palpitations. Also, a person can suffer hypertrophic cardiomyopathy and never feel any symptoms. The exact cause of the disease is not known but appears to stem from a genetic mutation. According to studies, 50 to 60 percent of people with the disease have a close relative with the disease. There may also be non-genetic factors, but research is still going on.

Treatment Options:
There are several treatment options with the choice depending on the risk to the patient and severity of the condition. Medications including anti-arrhythmia drugs and beta-blockers can partially remove the obstruction and relax the heart muscles. Blood thinners such as warfarin may also be prescribed to reduce the risk of blood clots. Alcohol septal ablation is a procedure involving the injection of alcohol into the artery that leads to the affected section of the ticker which causes a small, controlled heart attack, known as a localized myocardial infarction. The procedure not only helps to alleviate the symptoms, but also reduces the obstruction.

In patients at high risk, defibrillator therapy can prevent cardiac death. It monitors the heart rhythms and uses tiny electric shocks to correct any irregularities. Also, using a pacemaker for ventricular pacing can help the left ventricle to contract but isn’t a consistently successful method in all cases of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy.

Last, but not the least comes heart surgery. A section of the overgrown muscle is removed, and any obstruction is cleared in surgical myectomy which is a complex, open-heart operation which has proven successful at treating hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, with a low mortality rate of less than 1 percent. For hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, alcohol septal ablation has become the treatment of choice, at the same time there has been some controversy whether it should be a replaceable option for surgery for all patients. Cardiac transplant or heart transplant involves replacing the diseased ticker with a healthy one from a recently deceased donor which is used as a last resort when all other treatment methods have been unsuccessful.

If you are on the lookout to sign up for a CPR course in the Palm Harbor region, don’t look beyond the AHA certified CPR Tampa. Certified instructors conduct the classes through a series of audio and video lectures and hands-on practice. Equip yourself in the CPR procedure and always stay prepared to face cardiac emergencies efficiently. Contact CPR Tampa on 727-240-9404 to sign up for a program.

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