Slashdot Mirror
Hearts Actually Can Break
DesScorp writes "It seems that there's a grain of truth to one old wives' tale; it turns out that you really can die of a broken heart, especially if you're a post-menopausal woman. The Wall Street Journal reports on a phenomena called 'broken-heart syndrome,' which often occurs after great emotional distress. Quoting: 'In a conventional heart attack, an obstructed artery starves the heart muscle of oxygenated blood, quickly resulting in the death of tissue and potentially permanently compromising heart function. In contrast, the heart muscle in broken-heart-syndrome patients is stunned in the adrenaline surge and appears to go into hibernation. Little tissue is lost.' In the article a doctor notes, 'The cells are alive, but mechanically or electrically disabled.' Documented cases track heart attacks in people with seemingly healthy hearts after the grief of the death of a loved one. Intense feelings can cause the heart actually to change shape. Doctors call this 'tako-tsubo,' after the Japanese phrase for 'octopus trap,' so called because the syndrome was first identified by a Japanese doctor who noticed the strange shape in the left ventricle. Doctors note that while strong emotions like grief are usually associated with the syndrome, stress or a migraine can also trigger such heart attacks."
Hmm... According to this 2005 article, Dr. Ilan Wittstein came to the same conclusion after conducting a study:
http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1355/is_11_107/ai_n13452973/
Some might have conducted similar studies prior to his.
Everything I write is lies, read between the lines.
...they may say she died from a burst ventricle, but I know she died of a broken heart.
I am 31, had my heart broken 2 times. Really really broken. When my mom died and when I lost a girl I thought would become ms. Santax. I think everyone already knew this. It really hurts and it hurts where your heart is. Big time.
Leave it to the Japanese to somehow work tentacles into the ailment!
:)
Over hill, over dale, did the black Raven go.
Many autumns, many springs
Travelled he with wandering wings:
Many summers, many winters---
I can't tell half his adventures.
At length he came back, and with him a She,
And the acorn was grown to a tall oak tree.
They built them a nest in the topmost bough,
And young ones they had, and were happy enow.
But soon came a woodman in leathern guise,
His brow, like a pent-house, hung over his eyes.
He'd an axe in his hand, not a word he spoke,
But with many a hem! and a sturdy stroke,
At length he brought down the poor Raven's own oak.
His young ones were killed; for they could not depart,
And their mother did die of a broken heart.
10 PRINT CHR$(205.5+RND(1)); : GOTO 10
"You may say she died from a ruptured ventricle. But I know she died of a broken heart."
The ended up frying his brain so he would forget the woman--and all sorts of other stuff like his job. I think in the end it was actually something different and they fried his brain for nothing.
Liquid N2 can also break your heart. Shatter it actually
Comment removed based on user account deletion
" the heart muscle in broken-heart-syndrome patients is stunned in the adrenaline surge and appears to go into hibernation. Little tissue is lost."
I am not (as is probably abundantly obvious) a doctor; but that sounds substantially more treatable than the normal kind, albeit with all the same caveats about how serious each minute without a heartbeat will be for all your other systems, particularly the brain. It sounds like you wouldn't need to deal with the stents and shunts and bypasses and things, just come up with the right combination of drugs and electrical stimulation to get a basically functional piece of muscle tissue twitching again.
That is still no comfort at all if you are an hour away from medical attention, but it seems like it could be quite valuable for the cases that do make it to hospital before their brains are irrecoverable mush.
I'll let the people with mod-points take care of you. After that, please ask your parents to lock your pc. You are not ready for it yet.
Thanks for the link and information. I have dealt with it in the more usual way though. Just giving it time and learn to deal with it. Thanks though.
This is slashdot. You think any of us have women in our lives that can break our hearts? Pfft!
No, Mom doesn't count.. and if she did... eeewww!
new pre existing condition a bad relationship right next to rape on the list.
Funny? Not really.
I'm sure I saw this in an episode of Scrubs or something.
-- Lattyware (www.lattyware.co.uk)
...told us all this a long time ago.
EFT eh? Yes I find a strong, steady dose of Electronic Funds Transfer usually fixes a broken heart.
My great great grandmother went out that way. They immigrated from Scotland together, ran away to america as teenagers since her father wouldn't let them marry. Two days after my great great grandfather died, she passed away. They couldn't find a reason.
-- 4 8 15 16 23 42
Viol8, go away. There's no reason to hide behind AC.
Padme really did die of a broken heart!
Thank god for that. It was driving me absolutely nuts. Closure at last.
There was an episode of Scrubs which featured something like this. A woman who had broken up with her fiancé was admitted to hospital after fainting and other symptoms of a heart attack. Tests didn't reveal any heart abnormalities, but Dr. Cox diagnosed her as having a broken heart due to the stressful breakup.
First we're told that we actually can be bored to death, and now we're being told that hearts can actually break. What's next, that a watched pot actually never boils? That you really do attract more flies with honey than vinegar? That you really can be up on cloud 9? That video games really do make you fat? That a spoonful of sugar actually helps the medicine go down?
After a year, we'll find out that pigs can actually fly, and that Hell can actually freeze over! ;)
"Our country is not nearly so overrun with the bigoted as it is overrun with the broadminded." -Archbishop Fulton Sheen
"You are so beautiful, if you don't talk to me I could die of stress-induced cardiomyopathy"
Every mans' island needs an ocean; choose your ocean carefully.
On top of old Smokey
All covered with snow
I lost my true lover
For courting too slow.
Courting's a pleasure
And parting is grief
A false hearted lover
Is worse than a thief.
A thief will just rob you
And take what you have
But a false hearted lover
Will lead you to the grave.
-------
On top of Old Smokey
All covered with hair
Of course I'm referring
To Smokey the Bear!
Free Martian Whores!
"Hearts do not break / They sting and ache."
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
My bullshit detector just went haywire.
If he explores all forms and substances Straight homeward to their symbol-essences; He shall not die.
Or, you know, you could just harden the fuck up as Chopper Reid might say :-)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EY7lYRneHc
... or you can just grow up and deal with it without whinging.
When this girl I was seeing in Wow left me, I became sick and was hospitalized for 3 weeks... I was hoping we would marry in real life.
I still think of her sometimes...
Oh, life sucks.
"...while strong emotions like grief are usually associated with the syndrome, stress or a migraine can also trigger such heart attacks."
Could someone please educate the author, and if necessary the researchers (though I doubt it necessary) that strong emotions like grief are stressors, as are physiological disorders like migraines? Stress is the set, grief a subset. TFA seems to imply otherwise.
Any pressures to the system are stressors, and the system requires stress in order to function. Problems are due to poor handling of stress, which is called dis-stress. Turning stress to motivation is called eustress. Too much of the former (or too poor a job at handling it) can cause damage.
"I may be synthetic, but I'm not stupid." -- Bishop 341-B
So, instead of G.U.I.L.T., it's G.R.I.E.F.?
One of these days, I am going to flip out. When I flip out, I'll be back in five minutes.
My wife had another heart attack like this three weeks ago. It was her third. She was out of the hospital the next day. She's recovering rapidly. Previously she had been diagnosed as having 'Cardiac Syndrome X'. Sheesh.
I often think that medicine still hasn't progressed very far. People in the future will look back on the days when Americans spent 16% of GDP on health and still suffered in ignorance of what ails them.
Best regards.
This was the diagnosis in episode 121 of Scrubs "My House"
;)
Which was a parody of Dr. House by Dr. Cox in general but borrowed the following week's House diagnosis, episode 311 of the House MD "Words and Deeds"
back in good ole January 2007. WSJ is so behind the times.
'broken heart syndrome' is a phenomenon, not a phenomena.
Hi I am too lazy to make an account just to Say:
I already saw this on CSI
It's best just not to feel anything.
The bits on the bus go on and off... on and off... on and off...
...to never fall in love.
You think you need to be in love to be happy? This limiting belief was probably programmed into you early in your childhood. Remember that every emotional experience you have ever had was created by your own brain. Your lover didn't inject neurotransmitters into your skull...you created them.
True fulfillment always comes from within.
Also, if a pill existed that did to the brain what falling in love does to the brain, it would be illegal.
Looking forward to liver-stealing lesbians coming to slashdot.
Also, "a phenomena" - seriously?
sic transit gloria mundi
A woman can do a lot worse to a man than just leave him.
Having worked on death claims on life insurance in the past I've seen plenty of cases of elderly couples where the wife dies first and the husband dies soon after, but I'm pretty sure that they don't die of a broken heart. Instead my theory is that they don't look after themselves properly, since if all of a sudden you have to cook for yourself all the time it's a bit of a struggle, and it may be that many of them are still used to the traditional roles of wife as homemaker, husband as breadwinner, so it's hard for the husband to look after himself once he's on his own.
yesterday it's "BOERDOM KILLS SCIENTISTS SAY"...
Now today it's "HEART BREAK KILLS"
EFT eh? Yes I find a strong, steady dose of Electronic Funds Transfer usually fixes a broken heart.
Depends which way it's going...
./Rockwolf
February 9th, 2009 8:55pm: Slashdot becomes self-aware.