There are many types of heart diseases and main categories are discussed below and the others are under the main categories…
1) Coronary heart disease
2) Cardiomyopathy
3) Cardiovascular disease
4) Ischaemic heart disease
5) Heart failure
6) Hypertensive heart disease
7) Inflammatory heart disease
8) Valvular heart disease
1)Coronary heart disease
Coronary heart disease refers to the failure of the coronary circulation to supply adequate circulation to cardiac muscle and surrounding tissue. Coronary heart disease is most commonly equated with Coronary artery disease although coronary heart disease can be due to other causes, such as coronary vasospasm.
Coronary artery disease is a disease of the artery caused by the accumulation of atheromatous plaques within the walls of the arteries that supply the myocardium. Angina pectoris (chest pain) and myocardial infarction (heart attack) are symptoms of and conditions caused by coronary heart disease.
Over 459,000 Americans die of coronary heart disease every year. In the United Kingdom, 101,000 deaths annually are due to coronary heart disease.
***Coronary artery disease (CAD or atherosclerotic heart disease) is the end result of the accumulation of atheromatous plaques within the walls of the coronary arteries that supply the myocardium (the muscle of the heart) with oxygen and nutrients. It is sometimes also called coronary heart disease (CHD), but although CAD is the most common cause of CHD, it is not the only cause.
CAD is the leading cause of death worldwide. While the symptoms and signs of coronary artery disease are noted in the advanced state of disease, most individuals with coronary artery disease show no evidence of disease for decades as the disease progresses before the first onset of symptoms, often a "sudden" heart attack, finally arises. After decades of progression, some of these atheromatous plaques may rupture and (along with the activation of the blood clotting system) start limiting blood flow to the heart muscle. The disease is the most common cause of sudden death and is also the most common reason for death of men and women over 20 years of age. According to present trends in the United States, half of healthy 40-year-old males will develop CAD in the future, and one in three healthy 40-year-old women. According to the Guinness Book of Records, Northern Ireland is the country with the most occurrences of CAD. By contrast, the Maasai of Africa have almost no heart disease.
Cardiomyopathy literally means "heart muscle disease" (Myo= muscle, pathy= disease) It is the deterioration of the function of the myocardium (i.e., the actual heart muscle) for any reason. People with cardiomyopathy are often at risk of arrhythmia and/or sudden cardiac death.Extrinsic cardiomyopathies – cardiomyopathies where the primary pathology is outside the myocardium itself. Most cardiomyopathies are extrinsic, because by far the most common cause of a cardiomyopathy is ischemia. The World Health Organization calls these specific cardiomyopathies.
2.1 Alcoholic cardiomyopathy
Alcoholic cardiomyopathy is a disease in which the chronic long-term abuse of alcohol leads to heart failure. Alcoholic cardiomyopathy is a type of dilated cardiomyopathy. Due to the direct toxic effects of alcohol on heart muscle, the heart is unable to pump blood efficiently, leading to heart failure. It can affect other parts of the body if the heart failure is severe. It is most common in males between the ages of 35-50.
2.2 Coronary artery disease
Coronary artery disease (CAD or atherosclerotic heart disease) is the end result of the accumulation of atheromatous plaques within the walls of the coronary arteries that supply the myocardium (the muscle of the heart) with oxygen and nutrients. It is sometimes also called coronary heart disease (CHD), but although CAD is the most common cause of CHD, it is not the only cause.
CAD is the leading cause of death worldwide. While the symptoms and signs of coronary artery disease are noted in the advanced state of disease, most individuals with coronary artery disease show no evidence of disease for decades as the disease progresses before the first onset of symptoms, often a "sudden" heart attack, finally arises. After decades of progression, some of these atheromatous plaques may rupture and (along with the activation of the blood clotting system) start limiting blood flow to the heart muscle. The disease is the most common cause of sudden death, and is also the most common reason for death of men and women over 20 years of age. According to present trends in the United States, half of healthy 40-year-old males will develop CAD in the future, and one in three healthy 40-year-old women. According to the Guinness Book of Records, Northern Ireland is the country with the most occurrences of CAD. By contrast, the Maasai of Africa have almost no heart disease.
A congenital heart defect (CHD) is a defect in the structure of the heart and great vessels which is present at birth. Many types of heart defects exist, most of which either obstruct blood flow in the heart or vessels near it, or cause blood to flow through the heart in an abnormal pattern. Other defects, such as long QT syndrome, affect the heart's rhythm. Heart defects are among the most common birth defects and are the leading cause of birth defect-related deaths. Approximately 9 people in 1000 are born with a congenital heart defect. Many defects don't need treatment, but some complex congenital heart defects require medication or surgery.
2.4 Nutritional diseases affecting the heart
2.5 Ischemic (or ischaemic) cardiomyopathy
Cardiomyopathy, which literally means "heart muscle disease," is the deterioration of the function of the myocardium (i.e., the actual heart muscle) for any reason. People with cardiomyopathy are often at risk of arrhythmia or sudden cardiac death or both. Cardiomyopathies can be categorized as extrinsic or intrinsic.
2.6 Hypertensive heart disease
Hypertensive heart disease is any of a number of complications of arterial hypertension that affects the heart.
2.7 Myocardiodystrophy
Myocardiodystrophy is a type of noninflammatory heart disease that affects the myocardium. It is characterized by cardiac pain that occurs in the morning and that cannot be stopped even with normal treatments of nitroglycerin, along with other occurrences of heart rhythm disturbances, dyspnea, and various types of heart failure.
3) Cardiovascular disease
Cardiovascular disease is any of a number of specific diseases that affect the heart itself and/or the blood vessel system, especially the veins and arteries leading to and from the heart. Research on disease dimorphism suggests that women who suffer with cardiovascular disease usually suffer from forms that affect the blood vessels while men usually suffer from forms that affect the heart muscle itself. Known or associated causes of cardiovascular disease include diabetes mellitus, hypertension, hyperhomocysteinemia and hypercholesterolemia.
Types of cardiovascular disease include:
***Atherosclerosis (also known as arteriosclerotic vascular disease or ASVD) is a condition in which an artery wall thickens as the result of a build-up of fatty materials such as cholesterol. It is a syndrome affecting arterial blood vessels, a chronic inflammatory response in the walls of arteries, in large part due to the accumulation of macrophage white blood cells and promoted by low-density lipoproteins (plasma proteins that carry cholesterol and triglycerides) without adequate removal of fats and cholesterol from the macrophages by functional high density lipoproteins (HDL). It is commonly referred to as a hardening or furring of the arteries. It is caused by the formation of multiple plaques within the arteries.
4)Ischaemic heart disease
Ischaemic heart disease – another disease of the heart itself, characterized by reduced blood supply to the organs. Ischaemic or ischemic heart disease (IHD), or myocardial ischaemia, is a disease characterized by ischaemia (reduced blood supply) to the heart muscle, usually due to coronary artery disease (atherosclerosis of the coronary arteries). Its risk increases with age, smoking, hypercholesterolaemia (high cholesterol levels), diabetes, and hypertension (high blood pressure), and is more common in men and those who have close relatives with ischaemic heart disease.
5)Heart failure
Heart failure, also called congestive heart failure (or CHF), and congestive cardiac failure (CCF), is a condition that can result from any structural or functional cardiac disorder that impairs the ability of the heart to fill with or pump a sufficient amount of blood throughout the body. Therefore leading to the heart and body's failure.
***Cor pulmonale (Latin cor, heart + New Latin pulmōnāle, of the lungs) or pulmonary heart disease is enlargement of the right ventricle of the heart as a response to increased resistance or high blood pressure in the lungs.Chronic cor pulmonale usually results in right ventricular hypertrophy (RVH), whereas acute cor pulmonale usually results in dilation.
Hypertrophy is an adaptive response to a long-term increase in pressure. Individual muscle cells grow larger and change to drive the increased contractile force required to move the blood against greater resistance.Dilation is a stretching of the ventricle in response to acute increased pressure.
Hypertensive heart disease is heart disease caused by high blood pressure, especially localized high blood pressure. Conditions that can be caused by hypertensive heart disease include:
6.1 Left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH)
Left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH) is the thickening of the myocardium (muscle) of the left ventricle of the heart.
While ventricular hypertrophy occurs naturally as a reaction to aerobic exercise and strength training, it is most frequently referred to as a pathological reaction to cardiovascular disease, or high blood pressure.
While LVH itself is not a disease, it is usually a marker for disease involving the heart. Disease processes that can cause LVH include any disease that increases the after load that the heart has to contract against, and some primary diseases of the muscle of the heart.
Causes of increased afterload that can cause LVH include aortic stenosis, aortic insufficiency, and hypertension.
6.2 Coronary heart disease
Coronary disease (or coronary heart disease) refers to the failure of coronary circulation to supply adequate circulation to cardiac muscle and surrounding tissue. It is already the most common form of disease affecting the heart and an important cause of premature death in Europe, the Baltic states, Russia, North and South America, Australia and New Zealand. It has been predicted that all regions of the world will be affected by 2020.
It is most commonly equated with atherosclerotic coronary artery disease, but coronary disease can be due to other causes, such as coronary vasospasm. It is possible for the stenosis to be caused by the spasm.
It is most commonly equated with atherosclerotic coronary artery disease, but coronary disease can be due to other causes, such as coronary vasospasm. It is possible for the stenosis to be caused by the spasm.
6.3(Congestive) heart failure
Heart failure (HF) is generally defined as inability of the heart to supply sufficient blood flow to meet the body's needs. It has various diagnostic criteria, and the term heart failure is often incorrectly used to describe other cardiac-related illnesses, such as myocardial infarction (heart attack) or cardiac arrest.
Common causes of heart failure include myocardial infarction (heart attacks) and other forms of ischemic heart disease, hypertension, valvular heart disease, and cardiomyopathy. Heart failure can cause a number of symptoms including shortness of breath (typically worse when lying flat, which is called orthopnea), coughing, chronic venous congestion, ankle swelling, and exercise intolerance. Heart failure is often undiagnosed due to a lack of a universally agreed definition and challenges in definitive diagnosis. Treatment commonly consists of lifestyle measures (such as decreased salt intake) and medications, and sometimes devices or even surgery.
Heart failure is a common, costly, disabling, and potentially deadly condition. In developing countries, around 2% of adults suffer from heart failure, but in those over the age of 65, this increases to 6–10%.Mostly due to costs of hospitalization it is associated with a high health expenditure; costs have been estimated to amount to 2% of the total budget of the National Health Service in the United Kingdom, and more than $35 billion in the United States. Heart failure is associated with significantly reduced physical and mental health, resulting in a markedly decreased quality of life. With the exception of heart failure caused by reversible conditions, the condition usually worsens with time. Although some patients survive many years, progressive disease is associated with an overall annual mortality rate of 10%.
6.4 Hypertensive cardiomyopathy
Hypertensive heart disease is any of a number of complications of arterial hypertension that affects the heart.
Cardiac dysrhythmia (also known as arrhythmia) is a term for any of a large and heterogeneous group of conditions in which there is abnormal electrical activity in the heart. The heart beat may be too fast or too slow, and may be regular or irregular.
Some arrhythmias are life-threatening medical emergencies that can result in cardiac arrest and sudden death. Others cause symptoms such as an abnormal awareness of heart beat (palpitations), and may be merely annoying. These palpitations have also been known to be caused by atrial/ventricular fibrillation, wire faults, and other technical or mechanical issues in cardiac pacemakers/defibrillators. Still others may not be associated with any symptoms at all, but may predispose the patient to potentially life threatening stroke or embolism.
Some arrhythmias are very minor and can be regarded as normal variants. In fact, most people will on occasion feel their heart skip a beat, or give an occasional extra strong beat; neither of these is usually a cause for alarm.
Proarrhythmia is a new or more frequent occurrence of pre-existing arrhythmias, paradoxically precipitated by antiarrhythmic therapy, which means it is a side effect associated with the administration of some existing antiarrhythmic drugs, as well as drugs for other indications. In other words, it is a tendency of antiarrhythmic drugs to facilitate emergence of new arrhythmias.
The term sinus arrhythmia refers to a normal phenomenon of mild acceleration and slowing of the heart rate that occurs with breathing in and out. It is usually quite pronounced in children, and steadily decreases with age. This can also be present during meditation breathing exercises that involve deep inhaling and breath holding patterns.
7)Inflammatory heart disease
Inflammatory heart disease involves inflammation of the heart muscle and/or the tissue surrounding it.
7.1 Endocarditis
Endocarditis is an inflammation of the inner layer of the heart, the endocardium. It usually involves the heart valves (native or prosthetic valves). Other structures which may be involved include the interventricular septum, the chordae tendineae, the mural endocardium, or even on intracardiac devices. Endocarditis is characterized by a prototypic lesion, the vegetation, which is a mass of platelets, fibrin, microcolonies of microorganisms, and scant inflammatory cells. In the subacute form of infective endocarditis, the vegetation may also include a center of granulomatous tissue, which may fibrose or calcify.
There are multiple ways to classify endocarditis. The simplest classification is based on etiology: either infective or non-infective, depending on whether a microorganism is the source of the inflammation. Regardless, diagnosis of endocarditis is based on the clinical features, investigations such as echocardiogram, as well as any blood cultures demonstrating the presence of endocarditis-causing microorganisms.
7.2 Inflammatory cardiomegaly
Inflammation (Latin, inflammare, to set on fire) is part of the complex biological response of vascular tissues to harmful stimuli, such as pathogens, damaged cells, or irritants. Inflammation is a protective attempt by the organism to remove the injurious stimuli and to initiate the healing process. Inflammation is not a synonym for infection. Even in cases where inflammation is caused by infection, the two are not synonymous: infection is caused by an exogenous pathogen, while inflammation is one of the responses of the organism to the pathogen.
7.3 Myocarditis
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Inflammation of the myocardium, the muscular part of the heart.
Medicine (cardiology), myocarditis is inflammation of heart muscle (myocardium). It resembles a heart attack but coronary arteries are not blocked.Myocarditis is most often due to infection by common viruses, such as parvovirus B19, less commonly non-viral pathogens such as Borrelia burgdorferi (Lyme disease) or Trypanosoma cruzi, or as a hypersensitivity response to drugs.
The definition of myocarditis varies, but the central feature is an infection of the heart, with an inflammatory infiltrate, and damage to the heart muscle, without the blockage of coronary arteries that define a heart attack (myocardial infarction) or other common non-infectious causes. Myocarditis may or may not include death (necrosis) of heart tissue. It may include dilated cardiomyopathy.
Myocarditis is often an autoimmune reaction. Streptococcal M protein and coxsackievirus B have regions (epitopes) that are immunologically similar to cardiac myosin. After the virus is gone, the immune system may attack cardiac myosin.
Because a definitive diagnosis requires a heart biopsy, which doctors are reluctant to do because they are invasive, statistics on the incidence of myocarditis vary widely.
The consequences of myocarditis thus also vary widely. It can cause a mild disease without any symptoms that resolves itself, or it may cause chest pain, heart failure, or sudden death. An acute myocardial infarction-like syndrome with normal coronary arteries has a good prognosis. Heart failure, even with dilated left ventricle, may have a good prognosis. Ventricular arrhythmias and high-degree heart block have a poor prognosis. Loss of right ventricular function is a strong predictor of death.
8)Valvular heart disease
Valvular heart disease is disease process that affects one or more valves of the heart. There are four major heart valve which may be affected by valvular heart disease, including the tricuspid and aortic valves in the right side of the heart, as well as the mitral and aortic valves in the left side of the heart.
Types of Valvular heart disease
Valve involved | Stenotic disease | Insufficiency/regurgitation disease |
Aortic valve | Aortic valve stenosis | Aortic insufficiency/regurgitation |
Mitral valve | Mitral valve stenosis | Mitral insufficiency/regurgitation |
Tricuspid valve | Tricuspid valve stenosis | Tricuspid insufficiency/regurgitation |
Pulmonary valve | Pulmonary valve stenosis | Pulmonary insufficiency/regurgitation |
Pulmonary and tricuspid valve disorders
Pulmonary and tricuspid valve diseases are right-side heart diseases. Pulmonary valve diseases are the least common heart valve disease in adults.
The most common types of pulmonary valve diseases are:
The most common types of pulmonary valve diseases are:
· pulmonary valve stenosis
· pulmonary valve insufficiency
· pulmonary valve incompetence
· pulmonary valve regurgitation
The International Statistical Classification of Diseases classifies non rheumatic pulmonary valve diseases as I37.
Both tricuspid and pulmonary valve diseases are less common than aortic or mitral valve diseases due to the lower pressure those valves experience.
Complications arise when the flow of blood is obstructed from leaving the right ventricle and making it's way into the pulmonary Artery, or once blood is in the pulmonary artery, the blood has the ability to flow back into the right ventricle. When blood has a difficult time making it's way from the Right Ventricle into the pulmonary artery due to the pulmonary valve area being: Too narrow, deformed in some capacity (ie: One of the leaflets of the valve is to thick, misshaped, or doesn't separate from another leaflet), or the vessel above or below the valve being deformed in such a way as to prevent the proper flow of blood, the term "pulmonary valve stenosis" is used.
