Heart attacks are scary, no question about it. Recently my husband had a heart attack, caused by blood clot.

Disclaimer: this is not medical advice, please do call emergency services immediately if you are experiencing chest pain and breathing difficulties.

As the ambulance took some thirty minutes to arrive and my husband was in horrible pain in his chest and was obviously scared for his life, I gave him Aconite first and then Arnica, because I knew it would be a good idea to thin the blood in case of artery blockage and I had no aspirin in the house.

This kept him at bay until the paramedics arrived and were able to do an ECG on the spot to see what the score was. The medical consensus was that he had a full on heart attack caused by a blood clot.

After three days in hospital, he is back home and fine, overall and the experience got me to think about what homeopathy can do in similar cases.

Bur first, let’s look at the definition of heart attack.

WHAT IS HEART ATTACK

Heart attack or myocardial infarction (medically called MI or Coronary Thrombosis) is the consequence of complete obstruction of blood supply to a part of the heart muscles. This occurs due to 100% blockage in any of the coronary arteries or their branches. The heart muscles are completely deprived of their blood and oxygen supply which leads to its death.

WHAT IS THE CAUSE OF HEART ATTACK?

Almost all heart attacks are sudden in onset and the cause is rupture of growing blockages. The blockages are usually covered by a thin membrane called intimal membrane, which also keeps the deposits intact. This elastic membrane gets more and more stretched as more and more fatty deposits occur. But if the fatty deposits continue below this permeable membrane, one day a time will come when the membrane cannot stretch further and breaks off. This leads to the formation of a clot or thrombus inside the tube, closing the lumen completely. This completes the process of heart attack. The area of the myocardium (heart muscles) which gets the blood through the closed artery, dies – in the event of no blood supply.

HOW CAN HOMEOPATHY HELP?

Experiencing a heart attack, even if it is just suspected and turns out not to be life-threatening, is a really scary thing; the fear of dying is very real, therefore Aconite is the first port of call. Aconite acts on the heart and blood circulation, it will help to keep the blood pressure more stable and calm the sense of panic.

Arnica is a blood thinner (that’s why it’s so good for clearing or preventing bruises) and you need to keep the blood flowing easily, to clear the arteries. This is why the first thing doctors will give in such cases is aspirin, which is prescribed for a few months after the cardiac event.

Alternating these two remedies can be a good idea while you are waiting for medical help.

Other remedies to consider:

Coccus Grandiflorus

Digitalis

Kalmia

Kali Carbonicum

Lachesis Mutus

Naja

Glononium

In emergency situation, the potency should be fairly high: 10M would have been my choice, but I only had 30c in the house and so that is what I used, every five minutes.

POST CARDIAC EVENT

Once everything has calmed down and the patient is back to normal, it is imperative to have a period of rest and the doctor and hospital will advise on that.

Depending on each individual’s psychological make up, the will feel still shook up from the experience or exhausted and the self confidence can go out of the window for a while.

I find that Bach flower remedies can help a lot in this case and this is what I am giving my husband right now:

-Larch, to rebuild self confidence, the thought is “will I ever be able to do the things I used to do before?”

-Walnut: to help with transition. Men can find it particularly hard to go from busy working life to having to stay at home, pacing the floor up and down with no direction and nothing to do.

-Crab Apple: to clear the system from the medication he was given while in hospital

-Star of Bethlehem: to help absorb the shock of the whole thing

Another remedy to consider can be Aspen, if there is still fear for the future.

Do you want to have a chat about your health issues and find out what homeopathy can do for you? Book your free Assessment Session with me here.