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When you're having a heart attack, you don't have time to second-guess your symptoms. See more heart health pictures.
Heart attacks, or acute myocardial infarctions, are the leading cause of death for people over the age of 40 [source: GAA]. In the United States alone, there are 1.1 million heart attacks per year, and about 550,000 of those are fatal [source: NHLBI].
A heart attack happens when arteries get completely blocked and the heart is deprived of oxygen because blood can't get through the blockage. When the heart is deprived of oxygen, its cells start to die. The chest pain that most people associate with heart attacks is the heart's way of calling out for help when it starts dying.
Many people think heart attacks are more of a problem for men than for women, but in fact the opposite is true -- 53 percent of those who died from heart attacks in the United States in 1998 were women, and women may even have slightly different symptoms from men [source: GAA].
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Most heart attacks aren't as dramatically painful as the movies suggest. The symptoms of a heart attack are varied and may be mild. Chest pain is the most common sign, but some people don't experience that at all. There are a bunch of warning signs, and they're different from person to person. It's not easy to know whether a symptom like nausea or a racing heart is signaling a heart attack. In most cases, though, and especially if you have several risk factors for heart attack, it's better to call for professional help as soon as possible. The sooner you get treatment, the better the chance of survival. You should never wait more than five minutes if you think you might be having a heart attack.
But how do you know? In this article, we'll look at the five most common symptoms of a heart attack. Not everyone has all symptoms, and because each of them can signify an array of conditions, it may be difficult to clearly attribute any one of them to a heart attack. But some signs are surer than others and should have you dialing 911 as quickly as possible.
The most definite sign is first on our list: Where there is chest pain, medical care should follow without delay.
Learn more about what ails you. Here are some common symptoms.
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