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Question:
What happens to blood pressure and heart rate during a heart attack?
I have a simple question about heart rate....What happens to the blood pressure and heart rate during a heart attack?? Do they stay at normal range or increase and decrease?
submitted by Jonathan from Manila, Philippines on 3/11/10
Answer:
by Texas Heart Institute cardiologist, J. Alberto Lopez, MD
Either, both or neither. Usually, if the territory being affected is not life threatening, heart rate and blood pressure tend to increase due to the large amounts of adrenaline that is being produced. In other cases, conduction abnormalities may result in low heart rate, with or without normal pressure. In other cases if the infarct is very large, the blood pressure will be low and the heart rate significantly increased.
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Updated March 2010
