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2 Living Well
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Simi Valley Hospital
NO ONE PLANS
to have a heart
attack—but the reality is that heart at-
tacks occur at an alarmingly frequent
rate in the United States. According
to the American Heart Association,
heart disease (which includes heart attack and other
heart conditions) strikes someone in the U.S. every
43 seconds.
Whether you consider yourself healthy, at high-
risk for heart disease or somewhere in between, it’s
important to think ahead about what to do in case
you or someone you care about experiences a heart
attack. There’s a potentially life-saving reason for
planning ahead.
“In health care, we have a saying: ‘Time is myocar-
dium,’ or ‘Time is muscle,’” said Thanh Nguyen, DO, a
Simi Valley interventional cardiologist on the medical
staff at
Simi Valley Hospital
. “The longer you wait to
get help for a heart attack, the more your heart muscle
will likely suffer damage. Heart muscle doesn’t grow
back; once it’s dead, it’s dead forever.”
If you or someone near you experiences the symp-
toms of heart attack, don’t hesitate to call 911 immedi-
ately. Avoid the temptation to skip this step and drive
yourself to the hospital. You’ll likely be in a panic, and
if you really are having a heart attack, you may suffer
an arrhythmia, your blood pressure may suddenly drop
and/or you may lose consciousness—any of which
could cause a deadly accident.
Most important, while you may think you’re saving
time by going to the hospital in a private car, the reality
is that you’ll get care much more quickly by calling 911
For more information about heart disease, including prevention and support,
visit the American Heart Association website at
heart.org.
Crisis
of the
HEART
and waiting the very few minutes it takes for an ambu-
lance and EMTs to get to you. Treatment begins the
moment the EMTs arrive and continues all the way to
the hospital—giving a better chance that healthy tissue
in your heart will be spared.
Know when to make the call
One of the biggest challenges is knowing when it’s
time to seek medical help for the symptoms you think
might be a heart attack—especially if you’ve never
experienced heart disease before. You know you
shouldn’t wait to get help, but you don’t want to go
through the expense and potential embarrassment of
a false alarm.
That’s the kind of thinking you must banish,
medical experts say. Heart disease symptoms are
the culmination of events such as a blockage in
your coronary artery or a sudden plaque rupture
and closure of the artery with blood clots. These
symptoms are your body’s way of telling you your
heart needs help and that you need to seek
COMMON
HEART ATTACK
SYMPTOMS
Some of the more common symptoms
of heart attack include:
Chest pain
Fatigue
Back pain
Shortness
of breath
Epigastric pain
(pain or a feeling
like acid reflux
above the stomach
area toward the
left side or middle
of the chest)
Sweating
Dizziness
Nausea and/or
vomiting
Any one or a combination of
these occurrences may be a
symptom of heart attack or an impending heart
attack. Pay attention to these symptoms, and
don’t think twice about taking action and
calling 911 immediately.
You must
be your own advocate in these situations.
KNOWING THE SYMPTOMS AND TAKING QUICK ACTION