Dr. Anil Kumar

Our heart is basically a muscle. So when this muscle weakens the heart is unable to do its function i.e., to pump blood throughout our body and keep us alive.

The heart muscle gets progressively weak due to a disease called cardiomyopathy.

There are different types of cardiomyopathy caused by different causes. Untreated cardiomyopathy can lead to heart failure or early death. Treatment can’t cure the condition but can give you extra healthy years of life and prevent serious complications.

Cardiomyopathy has 4 main types, they are:

1. Dilated Cardiomyopathy: This is the most common form and its principal cause is that your heart muscle becomes too weak to pump blood. The heart muscles stretch and become thinner in this case leading to the four chambers of the heart to expand causing a pathology called an enlarged heart.

2. Hypertrophic Cardiomyopathy: This happens due to genetics. It occurs when the walls of your heart thicken and prevent the flow of blood through this natural pump.

3. Arrhythmogenic Right Ventricular Dysplasia: This is a rare form of cardiomyopathy. It causes sudden deaths of athletes and is caused when fat and fibrous tissues replace muscle in the right ventricle of the heart.

4. Restrictive Cardiomyopathy: This is the least common form of the disease. The cause is the stiffening of the ventricles, the part of the blood which receives blood. When these stiffen, the heart doesn’t get enough blood to oxygenate. Scarring of the heart due to heart disease and a heart transplant operation can be a cause of this stiffening.

5. Ischemic Cardiomyopathy: Ischemic cardiomyopathy is caused due to coronary artery disease which causes blood vessels supplying blood to the heart to become narrow. The heart doesn’t get enough oxygen and a person can die due to a heart attack.

6. Other types of cardiomyopathy are grouped into this category and can include:

   • Left ventricular noncompaction happens when the left ventricle has trabeculations, projections of muscle inside the ventricle.

   • Peripartum cardiomyopathy, another form of the disease can occur during or after pregnancy. This is a form of dilated cardiomyopathy and can be fatal. There’s no documented cause.

   • Alcoholic cardiomyopathy is caused due to alcoholism causing an enlargement of the heart.

   • Takotsubo cardiomyopathy, or broken heart syndrome, happens when extreme stress leads to heart muscle failure. Though rare, this condition is more common in post-menopausal women.

Treatment

Doctors will decide the treatment after finding out the extent of damage due to cardiomyopathy.

Few people will not require treatment till symptoms like chest pain, dizziness, shortness of breath and edema appear.

Others whose life is affected due to symptoms are treated with lifestyle changes and medicines. The bad news is that cardiomyopathy can’t be cured but can only be managed and controlled by doing the following:

1. Heart-healthy lifestyle changes are key. You will be advised to maintain a healthy weight, eat a modified diet, get enough sleep, manage stress, and quit smoking.

2. Exercise is also crucial to keep the heart healthy and maintain a healthy weight through regular bouts of low-intensity exercise.

3. Medications for high blood pressure will be prescribed to prevent water retention, keep the heart beating normally, prevent blood clots and reduce inflammation.

4. Pacemakers and defibrillators can be implanted.

5. Surgery like heart transplant can be done as a last resort.

In case you have a concern or query you can always consult an expert & get answers to your questions!

Love:It does make the world go round. With millions of songs and movies that have this emotion in its center, can it really be any other way? From early life, love acts as a security blanket from our parents, a growing up adventure with siblings and an out of the world experience with pets. When you learn to care and love, it becomes a life habit that helps you find happiness in all situations.

In several Harvard studies over the years on finding the 'secret of happiness'and the connection between happiness, health, and love, one common undisputed fact emerged that love and good relationships keep you healthier and happier. There really is no medicine like having someone to love and share a life with. Note that you need these reasons for being in love but it is great to know them any way.

1. The heart and love connection: Our heart has been connected with the emotion of love for so many reasons. Historically, the heart was thought to be the seat to thinking, emotions and memories. It beating extra hard during excitement and love gave an automatic connection to the two. This popular notion continued to take center stage even after it was scientifically proven that the heart only pumped blood while the brain took up other functionalities. The association remains strong until date where the beating heart as a life source is associate with love - which makes life a happy place.
2. Love can boost your immune system: A research by Ronald Glazer and Jan Kiecolt-Glaser suggested that couples who engaged in positive conflict resolution had a higher functioning immune system than those who didn't. Which means, if you get into an argument, you need to play fair and play nice. Couples who argued and stonewalled showed a larger decline in their immediate immune system functioning. Some connection!
3. Love more, live longer: According to a 2004 study by the CDC, married couples had the lowest mortality rates. Generally speaking, people who are in committed, loving relationships experience less stress which translates to improved heart health. Happy and loving relationships also coax us into giving up risky behaviours like smoking, especially when you want to raise a family. This in turn propels a healthy lifestyle.
4. It can reduce your pain: Pain is a feeling when we are physically harmed internally or externally and its intensity is controlled by our brain. But the heart plays an equally important role in its intensity - i.e. reducing it. If you hold the hand of the person you love, it can minimize your feelings of pain. No wonder then that women in labor hold their husband's hand to tide through the pain!
5. Love can keep your heart happy: Love increases the feeling of bliss and elevates you into a different sphere of optimism, energy and sense of well being - all of which go into keeping your heart healthy.