Chest Pain After Eating: Is It A Serious Condition For You?

Are you experiencing chest pain after eating? Was it consistent? If that is the case, it would be best to visit the nearest medical center immediately. This condition is hard to determine whether it is heartburn, high blood pressure or a heart attack. You better ask a piece of medical advice from your doctor before something worse happens.

What is chest pain?

Generally speaking, chest pain can make you wonder thoroughly of what it’s all about. Could it be just acid reflux, or are you already having a heart attack? If your chest pain gives you this burning sensation that doesn’t seem to go away, you better submit yourself to a doctor and have it checked. Furthermore, chest pain is quite tricky, especially if it falls under a heart attack. If you have heart problems and feel chest pain after eating, you can check on these symptoms to confirm if it’s a heart attack or heartburn.

Typical heartburn symptoms

Heartburn usually occurs when stomach acids go back to your esophagus. The esophagus is the connecting tube between the back of the throat and the stomach. Here are the other symptoms that you may feel or experience when you are having heartburn.

1. Burning sensation in your chest and at the back of your throat.
2. Chest pain when bending over, lying down or eating.
3. You will notice fluids at the back of your throat that can taste either hot, sour, acidic or salty.
4. Experiencing cough, sore throat or hoarseness in an extended period already.

These symptoms are enough to tell you its heartburn. However, when you visit your doctor, they might still request you to undergo medical tests to check how severe your condition is or if they have to monitor your condition.

Home remedies to work on your chest pain

If you have chest pain and it’s tolerable, you can try doing these simple home remedies to handle the pain. However, these remedies do not apply to individuals with angina.

1. Almonds: Eating a few almonds or drinking a cup of almond milk can help address your chest pain from heartburn. However, it would be best if you take it with moderation.
2. Cold pack: A muscle strain can also cause chest pain. You can try putting an ice pack if you notice swelling from that muscle strain to address it.
3. Hot drinks: It is an excellent way to get rid of the gas, especially if you are bloated. Besides that, it can even boost your digestion.
4. Baking soda: Make an alkaline solution using baking soda and warm or cool water. It can help reduce the acid in the stomach.

Furthermore, you cannot set aside that your chest pain may signify that you have a heart attack, especially if you have existing heart problems. Please continue reading the article for more information about it.

Heart problem

Even though chest pain doesn’t always mean a heart attack, the doctors will still conduct tests on it immediately. A burning sensation may be a sign of heart problems that is beyond the knowledge of the patient.

Heart problems may include any of the following:

1. Blood vessel disease
2. Arrhythmias
3. Heart valve issues
4. Congenital heart problems
5. Heart muscle disease
6. Heart infection

It goes to show that heart problems can be life-threatening. For this reason, it would be best to seek immediate medical advice on the first signs of a heart attack.

Heart attack symptoms

You better watch out and closely monitor for these symptoms. It might need immediate consultation with your doctor.

1. The center of your chest suffers from discomfort out of the feeling of pressure, squeezing, fullness, burning sensation, tightness or pain.
2. You may also experience pain, numbness, pinching, prickling or other sensations in either one or both of your arms, your back, neck, jaw or stomach.
3. You will have a shortness of breath.
4. Moreover, you may experience sudden nausea or vomiting.
5. Besides that, you may become dizzy or feel lightheaded.
6. You get to experience stranger fatigues.
7. Your body may feel hot or flushing. Otherwise, you have a cold sweat.
8. Either one or both of your arms can become heavy, weak, or aching suddenly.

Given these points and the symptoms are beyond your pain limits, it would be best to head on a medical facility the soonest possible time. Doing this will hinder you from facing a much greater risk.

Immediate medical actions

As shown above, heart problems are not something you should take lightly. Your doctor’s immediate medical advice is necessary. Below are the series of tests that the doctor may order you to undergo.

1. You will undergo an electrocardiogram (ECG) test to check your heart’s electrical activity.
2. The doctor may order you to have blood tests to confirm if there are sudden increases in particular protein or enzyme levels in your heart muscle.
3. Additionally, it also includes chest x-ray. It will allow your doctor to see the condition of the lungs. Moreover, it helps them know the size and shape of your heart and major blood vessels.
4. Lastly, they will also request a CT scan (computerized tomography) to check for potential blood clots in your lung or aortic dissection.

Depending on your results, you may still need to undergo follow-up tests to check your condition thoroughly. Follow-up tests may include an echocardiogram, another CT scan, stress tests and angiogram.

These series of tests only mean that chest pain may not be as simple as it seems to be. It could be a threat in your life and neglecting it is the worse thing you could do. These tests will help the doctor identify whether your chest pain is an initial sign of a heart attack or probably heartburn.

Conclusion

Home remedies may help you temporarily ease your chest pain. However, if the pain is persistent and unusual, the best thing you can do is proceed to your doctor. Do not think twice about meeting your doctor. Otherwise, you will be putting yourself in great danger.

Will you wait for this to happen than to take actions earlier? Chest pain after eating has something to do with your health. Please take responsibility for it instead of risking your life.