Coronary Artery Disease

Coronary Artery Disease

By Amber M. LaGard

Medical Terminology II

Thursday 6-9:45 PMPatient Name: Robert Barker

Reason for visit: Chest pain

Age: 53

Sex: Male

Race: Caucasian

A patient by the name of Robert Barker came into our office concerned about his health. Bob was having some chest pain. Bob is a 53 year old, white male. That afternoon, the doctor saw him in a room in the office. Bob said that he was concerned because he was having slight chest pain.

During the examination, some things stuck out that were not right. The patient showed high blood pressure and was over weight. When asked about some of the things in his life and in his past medical history, Bob told us about high cholesterol, that he smokes about a pack of cigarettes a day, he doesn't really exercise, and that he once has a grandparent that had some kind of heart trouble but he wasn't sure what it was that was wrong with the heart. There is no diabetes that runs in the family. Bob is not really stressed over anything at this time. Bob does not use any recreational drugs. Bob has never had any real health concerns before.

It was narrowed down that it could be a number of things but it was known that it involved Bob's heart. This could have many effects on his body if the problem was not pin pointed and solved.

Bob was asked if he had any other signs that might be relevant to helping find out what may be medically wrong. Bob said that he displayed chest pain while enduring physical activity. Sometimes even just walking up and down stairs would onset the chest pain. Bob seemed to be out of breath sometimes. With the breathlessness, Bob would cough. When asked if he may sweat profusely, he never really thought about it but could tell he sweat a lot at night while sleeping.

A blood test was conducted for heart enzymes. A couple of days later, the results returned to the office. The test showed that Bob had a raised amount of heart enzymes in his heart. That meant that we would have to run further tests to see what kind of problem there was with Bob's heart. After Bob came in for another visit, we recommended that he have an electrocardiogram to show the heart's activity. The test looked a little abnormal because of the irregular heartbeat. Bob then was given an option.

Bob was told that he had some clogged arteries inside of his heart. This leads to a condition of Coronary Artery Disease. It is treatable and the method of treatment depends on the severity of the plaque buildup in the arteries. Bob was given