One of the most vital organs in the body, your heart is responsible for pumping blood to the rest of your body while supplying your organs, muscles, and tissue with the oxygen that they need to work at their best.

Unfortunately, heart disease is one of the leading causes of death, both in the United States and around the world.

According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), 702,880 Americans died in 2022 from heart disease (1). This number represents around 20% of the total deaths from that year. Additionally, the CDC reports that 805,000 Americans have heart attacks every year, with 600,000 of those being first-time heart attacks.

With all of this information in mind, it’s important to recognize the early warning signs that indicate that something is wrong with your heart. Learn more about some symptoms of heart problems. Knowing is the most important part of keeping yourself safe and healthy.

Chest Pain and Discomfort

Many people who have heart attacks say that their symptoms begin with tightness in their chest. While chest pain is certainly a sign of heart problems, it’s important that you don’t wait until you’re in pain to seek medical attention.

Many people discount discomfort in their chest as indigestion or muscle pain, but it often points to something much more serious.

Angina is one of the most common heart problems in the world. This term refers to the pain that patients feel when the heart muscle doesn’t get enough blood.

While the heart pumps blood to the rest of your body through arteries, it gets blood back through veins. Angina commonly feels like indigestion or a high-pressure squeezing in the chest that can be mistaken for gas pains.

Heart attacks are typically more painful, but depending on their severity may not lead to the crushing or burning pain that many patients who’ve had severe heart attacks report.

Heart attacks, also referred to as myocardial infarctions, happen when blood flow to a part of the heart gets blocked. Heart attacks usually lead to pain in other parts of the body, too. Depending on how severe the attack is, patients report dealing with pain in the arm, neck, and jaw.

While you should seek medical help if you experience any of the symptoms of angina or a heart attack, heart attacks are typically more of an emergency. Conversely, angina is a long-term issue that can be treated with medication or surgery.

Shortness of Breath

While many people think of the lungs when they think about problems breathing, the heart is directly tied to the respiratory system. Since oxygen-rich blood must be pumped to the entire body, shortness of breath, also known as dyspnea, is often a sign of heart problems.

Tragically, it’s a sign of heart problems that many people ignore. When your heart isn’t pumping at its best, it allows fluid to build up in the lungs, resulting in shortness of breath or labored breathing, even if you haven’t been doing anything that’s physically demanding.

While shortness of breath doesn’t always point to cardiac issues, it’s important to note that several heart problems include shortness of breath as a symptom.

Heart failure, the most serious of these issues, happens when the heart simply isn’t strong enough to pump blood, resulting in fluid building up in the lungs.

In addition to experiencing shortness of breath during physical activity, many patients who deal with heart failure experience breathing problems when lying flat on their backs, as the fluid in the lungs spreads out, leaving less “dry” space in the lungs.

Additionally, arrhythmia, or irregular heart rhythm, can lead to shortness of breath. Your heart is designed to beat in a regular rhythm with small intervals between each beat.

Rapid, irregular heartbeats make your heart pump harder which leads to shortness of breath. Think about how hard your heart beats after you go for a run. Your breathing becomes shallow as your pulse rate increases. When you have arrhythmia, this can happen at any time.

Finally, pulmonary edema can cause shortness of breath. However, it’s usually linked to heart failure. Pulmonary edema happens when fluid starts to leak into the lungs’ air sacs because the heart isn’t able to pump blood away from itself as you need it to.

If you experience ongoing shortness of breath, even when you haven’t been exercising, you should seek medical help as soon as possible.

Swelling

Edema, which refers to swelling, especially in the legs, ankles, and feet, happens when the heart cannot pump blood to the muscles throughout your body, resulting in fluid building up in those areas.

Along with shortness of breath, this is a common sign of heart failure and is incredibly serious. Fortunately, it’s one of the easier signs to detect on your own.

If your feet and ankles always look puffy, you may be dealing with cardiac problems and should see your doctor as soon as possible.

In some instances, edema points to kidney problems. On the surface, this doesn’t always mean that you’re dealing with heart problems. Some kidney problems are standalone issues, but there are other instances in which kidney problems are linked directly to a lack of blood flow to those organs.

Venous insufficiency is another heart-related problem that can lead to swelling in the legs and feet. This term refers to what happens when the veins in a patient's legs cannot adequately pump blood back to the heart. This problem can point to heart failure and several other cardiac problems.

If you notice swelling, especially in your lower extremities, it’s a good idea to see a doctor as soon as you can. While it doesn’t always mean that you’re dealing with a heart problem, cardiac issues may be to blame.

Weakness and Fatigue

One of the most dangerous aspects of heart problems is that so many of the signs can be explained by other factors. Weakness and fatigue are two more examples that many people overlook because they can so easily be attributed to something else. After all, who hasn’t felt tired and run down after a few hard days?

However, when these symptoms are persistent, they often point to something wrong with the heart.

Once again, heart failure can be to blame for extended periods of fatigue and weakness. This is because your muscles rely on your heart to pump them the oxygen-rich blood that they need. When they’re not getting that, you’ll notice that it feels harder to perform even the most basic tasks.

Fatigue and weakness can also point to coronary artery disease (CAD). This disease affects the coronary artery and results in the muscle around the heart not getting the nutrients that it needs. With this depletion of minerals and nutrients, the heart cannot give the rest of the body what it needs.

Fatigue and general weakness can point to any number of issues that aren’t related to cardiac health. With this in mind, if these symptoms persist, you should discuss them with your primary care physician.

Heart Health=Overall Health

When your heart is healthy, the rest of your body can operate as you need it to. Recognizing the early warning signs associated with cardiac problems can allow you to act quickly and get the help that you need.

It’s important to understand that many heart problems can be treated with medications and changes to your regular diet and exercise plans. Taking care of your heart is an investment in your overall health and well-being.

Sources:

1. Center For Disease Control. (2024, May 15). About Heart Disease. https://www.cdc.gov/heart-disease/about/index.html