Definition
Chest pain (called thoracic pain by the medical profession) occurs in a wide variety of forms and intensities and can therefore have a wide variety of causes. For example, the pain can be pressing, throbbing or stabbing, motion-dependent or motion-independent and accompanied by various other symptoms such as heartburn, vomiting, increased sweating or upper abdominal pain. The pain can also radiate into various other parts of the body, for example, in the case of a heart attack often into the left arm. Depending on the severity, type, localization and accompanying symptoms, much can be assumed about the cause of the pain
Causes
Pain in the chest can have many different causes. Rather rarely the heart is the trigger, but this dangerous possibility should not be ignored and chest pain should always be taken seriously. Diseases affecting the heart include heart attack, myocarditis or marsupial inflammation, heart valve defects and cardiac arrhythmia.
Injuries and tears in the aorta are typically accompanied by a virtually tearing pain. You can find information about these clinical pictures in our section on diseases of the heart. If the lung is affected, it can be a pulmonary embolism (blockage of a pulmonary artery), a pneumothorax (air between the lung and the chest cavity, which leads to the collapse of the lung) or a pneumothorax.
Refluxoesophagitis, an inflammation of the esophagus caused by ascending gastric acid, can also cause chest pain, as can tears in the esophagus or a cramping of the ring-shaped esophageal muscles. In addition, the muscles surrounding the chest can cause chest pain, for example if they are excessively cramped or torn. Pain from other parts of the body can also radiate into the chest, for example abdominal pain in the case of biliary colic. Finally, the pain does not always have to have a physical cause: Even great psychological stress or emotional strain can be reflected in chest pain without the body lacking anything.
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