Each year in Australia more than 56,000 peoples become the victim of Heart attack and almost 9,300 of them die as a result. A recent research on the heart attack patients reveals that respiratory infection is one of the main culprits for increasing the risk of heart attack or cardiac arrest.
Researchers from the University of Sydney in Australia made their studies of 578 patients whose hearts recently got attacked due to coronary artery blockage. As per their confessions and medical report, almost 17 percent of them got heart attack within the seven days affecting respiratory infections. The number reached up to 21 percent within 31 days.
Researchers pointed out three types of respiratory infections such as pneumonia, influenza, and bronchitis that are associated with the risk of heart attack. In the paper of Internal Medicine Journal researchers described that they have used coronary angiography to confirm the reason.
Lead researcher and cardiologist from University of Sydney, Royal North Shore Hospital and Heart Research Australia, Professor Geoffrey Tofler said,“Our findings confirm what has been suggested in prior studies that a respiratory infection can act as a trigger for a heart attack”. he also explained that most of the heart attack cases caused by the infection were increased during the winter in Australia.
According to Mail Online, patients felt a sore throat, cough, fever, sinus pain, flu-like symptoms before their heart attack. Tofler and his team pointed some reasons why respiratory infection may trigger a heart attack that includes changes of blood flow, damaging of blood vessels by toxins and inflammations, and blood clotting tendencies.
At the second phase of their experiment researchers conducted an another analysis at the upper respiratory tract infections that include common colds, pharyngitis, sinusitis, and rhinitis. However, infection in the upper respiratory tract is less severe and more common than lower respiratory tract symptoms, but it can still increase the risk of heart attack by 13 times.
Apart from respiratory infection, there is an another factor which can increase the risk of heart attack that is the strong doses of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs. Researchers also mentioned five form of painkillers [ibuprofen, celecoxib, diclofenac, naproxen, and rofecoxib] that are the greatest enemies of heart.
