Heart Attacks

What causes a Heart Attack?

A heart attack is caused when blood vessels that supply blood back to the heart are being blocked, preventing oxygen to getting towards your heart. If the blood flow from your coronary arteries are blocked it starves your heart of oxygen and heart cells begin to die from the lack of oxygen.

How do you know you are having a Heart Attack?

Some of the main symptoms towards heart attacks are chest pains, Pain sometimes around your body. You also may sweat, have short breaths, feel fatigue and become dizzy.

How do you prevent a Heart Attack?

Some ways to help prevent a Heart Attack are to quit smoking if you do, control your blood pressure and cholesterol levels, exercise regularly, be a healthy weight, control your diet, don't stress as much and try not to drink as much. It won't immediately stop you from having a heart attack but it can help reduce the percentage a bit. 

Heart Details

Your heart has two sides, one is thick while the other is thin. The thick side produces blood for your whole body, whereas the thin side collects the blood from your veins and capillaries. Your heart also has fat, which is a thick white substance that your body is also covered in. Your heart mainly consists of cardiac muscle cells (or Myocardium). Valves control the blood flow in your veins. On the top of the heart there are two holes that are called the Aorta and the Superior Vena Cava. The aorta carries blood around your whole body and the Superior Vena Cava carried De-oxygenated blood towards your heart to be oxygenated.

Lamb Heart Dissection 

We were given the chance to dissect a lambs heart because we were learning about how the heart works. The first thing we did was create a little covered table for the heart and wore gloves. We then were given the heart and a scalpel, scissors and tweezers to help dissect the heart. We then cut up the heart and looked at the veins, cartilage and muscles. At first we thought it was a pigs heart and then realized that it was a lambs heart.The difference between a lambs heart and a pigs heart is how close it is towards a humans heart. A pigs heart closely resembles a humans heart with how it looks and where all the holes are.

^Lamb Heart^

^Pig Heart^