How can heart arteries become blocked?
Coronary artery disease develops over years as fatty deposits (plaques) build up in the walls of the arteries. When these plaques become significantly narrowed or rupture suddenly, they can cause reduced blood flow — or in the case of a rupture, a heart attack. Dr Ravi Assomull outlines how lifestyle and genetics influence plaque development and risk.
Learn more about Environmental risk factors or book a consultation with Dr Assomull – no GP referral needed, appointments typically within one working day.
Transcript
The arteries in your heart gradually, even from your teen years, start accumulating fatty deposits in the wall. Now that's a very gradual process that goes on from year to year and decade to decade. How fast that progresses depends on a variety of factors, including your genetics, your lifestyle, whether you smoke, what you eat.
And typically it really takes a narrowing of around seventy to 80% before you get reduction in the blood that to the heart muscle and you exert yourself. Another type of blockage is slightly different. That's when a small, minor narrowing suddenly becomes an acute hundred percent occlusion of an artery, and that's really what causes a heart attack.
And typically what happens is one of these fatty plaques tears, it ruptures, and that creates a coagulation cascade, which basically means you get a blood clot blocking the vessel and causing complete loss of blood supply to heart muscle; and that results in the dreaded heart attack.
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