TYPES OF CARDIOVASCULAR DISEASES

The cardiovascular system comprises of the heart and the blood vessels. This system ensures that there is the blood supply to all body tissues. The heart pumps blood through the blood vessels, which in turn supply the very blood to all areas of the body. Once there is a disease affecting any of the system’s components, it’s called a cardiovascular disease. The types of cardiovascular diseases vary depending on the cause and the affected part of this system. There can be diseases of both the heart and the blood vessels.

Blood Vessel Diseases

Blood vessels help the body to get blood rich in oxygen and nutrients in addition to helping the tissues get rid of unwanted wastes like carbon dioxide. Once they get an infection, they can be inflamed, and their function can be impaired. Infections can lead to vasculitis among other vascular diseases. Similarly, conditions like atherosclerosis and arteriosclerosis can affect their functional capacity. The other type of vascular disease is the peripheral vascular disease, which affects the blood vessels that supply the limbs, thus poor blood supply to the very limbs. Also, cerebrovascular disease is a vascular disease that impairs the normal function of the vessels supplying the brain. This disease can complicate and give rise to a stroke, which is a fatal disease.

Heart Diseases

There are many heart diseases that include:

Coronary heart disease. This disease affects the coronary arteries of the heart. Due to the presence of fats, cholesterol and other materials in the blood, plaque may deposit on the walls of these vessels, narrowing or even clogging them. Such a phenomenon results in coronary heart disease That interferes with blood flow to the heart, hence myocardial infarction.

Heart attack. This disease is also known as acute myocardial infarction because the heart muscle undergoes infarction when there is a poor supply of oxygenated blood. That occurs when the coronary artery gets blocked or narrow in a way that denies the cardiac muscles adequate blood. For this reason, most heart attacks are a complication of coronary heart disease.

Congenital heart diseases. This kind of diseases is present in an individual during the time of birth. They are linked to genetic factors in the family since most of the people who have them are found to have a family history of the disease. In addition, mothers who use drugs like cocaine and thalidomide among many others are likely to have congenital heart disease. Smoking and excessive intake of alcohol are some of the risk factors for these diseases. They include ventricular and atrial septal heart defects and congenital heart valve diseases among others.

Cardiomegaly. This disease is characterized by an abnormally enlarged heart. The condition comes about when the heart works hard to pump blood due to underlying conditions like hypertensive heart disease. The enlargement impairs the normal heart function.

Infectious diseases. Infections from pathogenic microorganisms can spread to the circulatory system and affect not only the heart, but also other body parts through blood. Diseasess like endocarditis, myocarditis and pericarditis are caused by microbial pathogens. Rheumatic heart disease is also one of the diseases that occurs secondary to infections.

Pulmonary heart disease. This disease occurs when the right side of the heart fails to perform its normal functions of receiving blood from the body parts and pumping it to the lungs. Such an occurrence affects both the pulmonary system and the heart, hence the name pulmonary heart disease.

In general, there are many types of cardiovascular diseases. These diseases affect both the heart and the blood vessels. They vary depending on the cause and a part of the system that they affect.