Heart disease - causes and types of heart disease

Heart Disease is a hot health topic today. With all of the information about heart disease on both TV and the Internet, do you really know which information is advice that you can trust on heart disease? How about information that is not accurate on heart disease?

heart_disease|Heart-diseases

There are many different kinds of "heart disease" and we will briefly touch on those in this article, as well.

What Is Heart Disease?


What exactly is

heart disease

? The latest definition of heart disease is any disease that affects how the heart normally works. Narrowing or hardening of the arteries that lead to the heart is the most common type of cardiac disease, today. Of course this can encompass quite a few types or variations of
heart disease.

Various types of heart disease include:

  1. Alcoholic cardiomyopathy
  2. Aortic regurgitation
  3. Aortic stenosis
  4. Arrhythmias
  5. Cardiogenic shock
  6. Congenital heart disease
  7. Coronary artery disease (CAD)
  8. Dilated cardiomyopathy
  9. Endocarditis
  10. Heart attack (myocardial infarction)
  11. Heart failure
  12. Heart tumor
  13. Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy
  14. Idiopathic cardiomyopathy
  15. Ischemic cardiomyopathy
  16. Acute mitral regurgitation
  17. Chronic mitral regurgitation
  18. Mitral stenosis
  19. Mitral valve prolapse
  20. Peripartum cardiomyopathy
  21. Pulmonary stenosis
  22. Stable angina
  23. Unstable angina
  24. Tricuspid regurgitation
As you can see, there are many categories of what actually constitutes heart disease. Now that we have identified different types of cardiac disease, let's explore some of the underlying causes of these diseases.

Causes Of Heart Disease

Just as many different names for cardiac disease can be confusing and complicated, so can the causes of heart disease. And we will cover the most common causes below.
Briefly, here are some causes:

  1. Cholesterol | Cause of Heart Disease
  2. Obesity and Heart Disease
  3. Hypertension ("high blood pressure")
  4. Heart valves that do not function normally
  5. Electrical conduction of the heart that causes an abnormal rhythm.
  6. Heart's pumping function that is affected by toxins or infections.
  7. Congenital or "birth defects" of the heart.

How Many People Are Affected By Heart Disease?

According to the National Institute of Health, there are approximately 70.1 million people affected by some type of cardiac disorder! Heart disease continues to be the number one cause of death in the US.

Among minorities, cardiac disease or heart disease, ranks first as leading cause of death. The rates of deaths declined for those groups with the exception of one group, American Indian females. The time frame for this study was between 1985 and 2002. Between 1992 and 2002, the percentage of decline of death rates for CHD (Cardiac Heart Diseas) was the highest among white males and the least decline was in the black female population.

Financial Impact Of Cardiac Disease

Besides the horrific costs of CHD in terms of personal tragedy, society also bears the brunt of the effects of this disease.

According to the study, 2005 costs for CVD(Cardiovascular Disease) were staggering. Overall, costing 393 Billion Dollars! This is all about Heart Disease.

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