What is acute pericarditis?
Acute pericarditis occurs when your pericardium becomes swollen, infected and inflamed. Acute pericarditis is often the result of a bacterial infection, but it may start from something like tuberculosis and spread from your lungs to your pericardium.
What is a pericardium?
A pericardium is a small, protective sac that wraps around your heart to protect it, root it in place, and lubricate it. The pericardium keeps your heart in good working order, like a perfectly functioning machine.
What are the symptoms of acute pericarditis?
One of the major symptoms of acute pericarditis is chest pain. Sudden, sharp stabs of pain may occur in your chest, or dull, hard, plodding ones may occur. Either way, if your first instinct is to lie down in order to relieve it, you’ll soon find that it only grows worse. On the other hand,if you lean forward to relieve it, you’ll find that this posture helps somewhat. It will also hurt badly to cough, to eat, and to breathe deeply. The pain may reach into your arms and spread to your back. The pain, in fact, may feel a lot like a heart attack! It’s hard to tell with chest pain; it’s hard to tell exactly what you’re suffering. It becomes crucial, therefore, for you to see your doctor if you’re experiencing unusual chest pain right away. He or she can then look at your symptoms and tell you if you’re suffering from acute pericarditis or something else.
What are some other symptoms of acute pericarditis?
When acute pericarditis occurs, your pericardium is swelling up and out, becoming enflamed. Any time you have something enflamed in your body the result can be high, intense fever. Fever, then, is one of the symptoms of acute pericarditis. Again, acute pericarditis can be deceiving. After all, it shares symptoms with other maladies, such as heart disease and low blood pressure; and fever can occur frequently and attach itself to numerous disorders. Enlisting the help of the experts is the only way to know for sure what you are suffering from.
How will the doctor be able to tell if I have acute pericarditis?
One of the major symptoms that your doctor will be looking for when checking you for acute pericarditis is a certain sound that emanates from the chest in those circumstances. The sound, oddly, is a squeaky, raspy one; some have compared it to the sound of leather rubbing against leather. The speculation is that the two walls of the pericardium, usually thin and therefore separate from each other, have now ballooned outwards and are rubbing together. Other heart conditions, such as a heart murmur, produce sounds, too, but each sound is specific to its ailment, and your doctor will be able to confidently assess what you have.
How will my doctor fight my acute pericarditis?
First, he or she will have to decide whether or not your case is severe enough that you need to the stay in the hospital. They will ask you for the medications, if any, that you’re currently on, in order to see whether or not that medication makes acute pericarditis worse. They’ll try to relive you from suffering, usually with aspirin and anti-inflammatory drugs such as ibuprofen. If the pain is very, very intense, you can try something like morphine, and there are medications made specifically to combat acute pericarditis. Some cases are severe enough that surgery is required. In that case, your doctor will open up a small hole in your pericardium, and insert a device which sucks bacteria and other buildups out of your system.