How Does COVID-19 Affect Your Heart?

While most discussion about the harmful effects of the COVID-19 coronavirus has revolved around the damage it can do to your lungs, research has indicated that the virus can also cause potentially dangerous swelling and muscle weakness of the heart. While the impact of the coronavirus on heart health has not yet been fully gauged, some things are clear about COVID and your heart.

Though the novel coronavirus mostly affects the lungs, it can directly attack other organs as well.

COVID-19 is primarily a respiratory infection, but it may also invade other organs as it circulates in the bloodstream. If the virus directly affects the heart (myocarditis) it can cause chest pain abnormal heart rhythms and heart failure. Infection of the heart lining (pericarditis), can also cause chest pain and abnormal heart rhythms.

Immune response to a severe COVID-19 infection may cause damage to the heart.

In some cases, patients who are very sick with the novel coronavirus have had an immune overreaction which causes a dangerous level of inflammation. This may result in organ damage, especially to the heart and liver.

People with a history of cardiac problems are at a higher risk of heart complications from COVID-19.

As is also true of the influenza virus, COVID-19 has a higher likelihood of causing severe cardiovascular damage among patients who have a pre-existing cardiac issue such as:

Heart disease
High blood pressure (hypertension)
Stroke
Diabetes
Obesity

COVID-19 may also cause problems to emerge for patients who have undiagnosed heart disease. Fever and inflammation can exacerbate blockages in the heart or bloodstream which had previously not shown any symptoms. The same factors may also cause the formation of dangerous clots in the bloodstream.

Can COVID Increase/Elevate Your Heart Rate?

According to research, observed patients with COVID experienced persistent tachycardia syndrome (high heart rate compensated by low blood pressure) with fatigue, muscle aches, and pains. It is also worth noting that symptoms such as fever and inflammation can cause an increased heart rate and metabolic demand on the heart, as well as other organs. The stress on the body further compounds if the lungs are working extra hard to exchange oxygen adequately when infected with a virus.

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