Coronary Heart Disease

Coronary Heart Disease (CHD), also known as Ischaemic Heart Disease, is one of the leading causes of death in Scotland - (9,532 deaths in 2006). Scotland has one of the highest death rates from CHD in the western world. This has been attributed to high rates of smoking, poor diet and deprivation. The treatment of CHD is a major part of the work of NHSScotland.

In the year ending 31 March 2007 :-

NHSScotland hospitals had 47,924 hospital discharges for CHD, of which 15,884 were for Acute Myocardial Infarction(AMI) also known as heart attack.
CHD discharges represented around 4% of all acute hospital discharges.

NHSScotland carried out 2,121 Coronary Artery Bypass Grafts (CABG), 5,779 angioplasties and 16,516 angiographies (provisional for year ending 31 March 2007)

Updated information can be found in Statistics

What is Coronary Heart Disease?

- The heart, like all muscles, needs oxygen from the blood to function. The heart has its own blood vessels, the coronary arteries, to supply it. But these arteries can become clogged up in places with fatty deposits (atheroma) which narrow them, restricting the blood-flow. This leads to coronary heart disease.

The main conditions included in the category of CHD are as follows:

acute myocardial infarction (AMI) - commonly known as a heart attack. This happens when part of one of the coronary arteries becomes blocked, either by a blood clot or a loose piece of fatty deposit. An area of the heart muscle becomes deprived of blood and is damaged. The sudden loss of blood supply usually causes severe pain and may make the heart beat unstable and effectively stop. Even if the heart rhythm remains adequate, the amount of muscle damage may affect the ability of the heart to function as a pump, leading to heart failure. It is often possible to treat AMI within the first few hours with thrombolytic drugs which act by breaking up the causative blood clot and reducing the resultant muscle damage.

angina pectoris - this refers to recurrent chest pain as a result of CHD. The narrowed coronary arteries become unable to supply sufficient blood in response to increased demands, such as exercise, causing a cramp-like pain. Angina often responds well to medication and lifestyle changes, but where pain cannot be regulated it may be treated with physical methods to unblock the artery, such as coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) or angioplasty (instrumental dilation of artery, sometimes leaving a structure in place - stent - to try to prevent the recurrence of narrowing of artery).