When we talk about identifying a cardiac arrest, it is a bit difficult. This happens mainly because there are cases in which the symptoms are barely perceptible or they cam be mistaken by something else, such an indisposition, a food poisoning, or a severe cold. But when you know you are at risk, make sure that you don’t overlook these symptoms, even if they are doubtful sometimes. Then you should see the doctor as soon as possible.

A heart attack can be diagnosed through an electrocardiogram that is recording the activity of your heart or through a blood test that determines whether the cardiac enzymes are present in the blood. The blood tests are efficient in the sense that the cardiac enzymes appear in the blood only when the heart muscles are dying. Therefore, the higher the quantity of cardiac enzymes, the higher the risks of experiencing a heart attack.

The most important thing in the prevention and in the treatment of the heart attacks is the medical attention that you offer to your body. As long as you see the doctor as frequently as possible, there shouldn’t be any serious damages, namely a severe cardiac arrest. If you do have a condition that predisposes you to a heart attack, then the therapy for your curing starts, and if the diagnosis in not clear enough as to make a certain diagnosis, then you will be immediately put under surveillance and monitoring by your doctor.

If you happen to be near a person who seems to have suffered from a heart attack, there are some things that you should to. First, state of conscience of the person, and if the person is conscious, take him/her to the hospital where the doctors will continue the clinical exam of the patient. If the patient is not conscious, then position the person on his/her back, open the tie, the shirt and the belt, try to free the respiratory tracts by mildly lifting his/her head. Check if the patient has any pulse. If he/she has pulse, then pay attention to the movements of the thorax, listen to the breathing, and in the case in which the patient has a pulse but he/she is not breathing then continue with the liberation of the respiratory ways, clean his/her mouth, perform the mouth-to-mouth ventilation, check if the air reaches the patient’s chest. If the patient is not breathing and he/she does not have a pulse, begin the external cardiac massage, and immediately call for help. Usually, the chances of survival diminish a lot if the first aid was not performed in the first five minutes after the appearance of the cardiac arrest.

The treatment of the heart attack usually involves medicines that prevent the formation and the growth of the blood clots in the arteries, a coronary angiography, surgical interventions that involve the opening of the arteries, medicines that help the opening of the arteries, some patients are given supplemental oxygen that increases the supply of oxygen to the heart’s muscle, medicines that prevent the appearance of any types of imbalances at the level of the heart.

The treatment of the cardiac arrest involves, in the first place, the opening of the blocked artery and then the restoring of the blood flow to the heart muscle, this method being called reperfusion. The damage against the heart muscle will stop the moment the artery is open. The patients whose hearts are not capable of pumping enough blood will experience at some point severe heart problems, and therefore, the person who has gone through a heart attack has to make sure that he/she will take all the required measures to keep healthy his/her heart muscle.