chest pain
Sign in to savediscomfort or pain felt anywhere along the front of the body between the neck and upper abdomen
Key facts
- Other names
- Pectoralgia, stethalgia, thoracalgia, thoracodynia
- Specialty
- Emergency medicine , internal medicine , cardiology
- Symptoms
- Discomfort in the front of the chest
- Types
- Cardiac , noncardiac
- Diagnostic method
- Medical history, physical exam , medical tests
- Treatment
- Based on the underlying cause
- Medication
- Aspirin , nitroglycerin
- Prognosis
- Depends on the underlying cause
- Frequency
- ~5% of ER visits
via Wikipedia infobox
Research
106,293 papersvia PubMed
Article
Chest pain is pain or discomfort in the chest, typically the front of the chest. It may be described as sharp, dull, pressure, heaviness or squeezing. Associated symptoms may include pain in the shoulder, arm, upper abdomen, or jaw, along with nausea, sweating, or shortness of breath. It can be divided into heart-related and non-heart-related pain. Pain due to insufficient blood flow to the heart is also called angina pectoris. Those with diabetes or the elderly may have less clear symptoms.
Serious and relatively common causes include acute coronary syndrome such as a heart attack (31%), pulmonary embolism (2%), pneumothorax, pericarditis (4%), aortic dissection (1%) and esophageal rupture. Other common causes include gastroesophageal reflux disease (30%), muscle or skeletal pain (28%), pneumonia (2%), shingles (0.5%), pleuritis, traumatic and anxiety disorders. Determining the cause of chest pain is based on a person's medical history, a physical exam and other medical tests. About 3% of heart attacks, however, are initially missed.