Galway cardiologist in Valentine’s Day health appeal – ‘listen to your heart’

As shelves and windows become festooned with heart-shaped decorations, a Galway cardiologist is spreading awareness on heart health, explaining how early symptoms of cardiac issues are often underestimated or misinterpreted.

Galway native Dr Roisin Colleran works at the Mater Private Network, and is, this February 14, asking people to “listen” to their heart.

Dr Colleran explained that anyone, no matter their age, should get checked regularly and pay attention to a number of symptoms while trying to prevent heart issues as much as they can.

Symptoms include chest discomfort and shortness of breath, particularly when exercising, as well as palpitations and flutters in the heart. Roisin explained that these signs could, for example, be symptoms of narrow arteries or abnormal heartbeat that can increase the risk of stroke.

She added that these symptoms are often underestimated or can be misjudged.

Dr Colleran said: “People typically think that cardiac pain is a very severe pain or sharp pain in the chest, but actually that’s not true.

“It’s usually described as a discomfort or a pressure or a tightness or a heaviness in the chest, that comes on during exercise and goes away then with rest. So oftentimes a patient won’t present because they don’t think their symptoms are bad enough.

“Also, because it’s in the centre of the chest it can often be confused with stomach symptoms, with indigestion.

“In women, symptoms can be a little bit more atypical, so perhaps less chest pain but more atypical symptoms like dizziness or indigestion, or shortness of breath. And that can be misinterpreted by a woman or not interpreted as cardiac pain.

“So I think sometimes these symptoms are underestimated.”

The Galway cardiologist added that prevention is key:

“We know that about 80 to 90% of cardiovascular disease is preventable and that’s by treating risks factors if they have them, so blood pressure, cholesterol, diabetes etc, but also by preventing the development of risk factors.

So a number life changes, not matter how small, can make a huge different for people as Dr Colleran cited exercising more, not smoking, but most importantly start doing regular check ups from their 20s.

She explained check-ups “can help identify things like blood pressure or cholesterol that don’t cause symptoms themselves.”

She added: “For coronary-artery narrowing, we do see people in the late 30s having heart attacks, it’s not common, but we do know that the narrowing of the arteries takes decades to develop and prolonged exposure to things like high cholesterol and high blood pressure are often part of the reason that develops.

“So that’s the reasons why preventing the development of risk factors, even in young people, would help them to prevent these problems.”

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