Self Care Articles

Is this your symptom?

• Pain or discomfort in the chest (front or back)
• The chest includes from the top to the bottom of the rib cage
• Care guide does not cover pain due to a chest injury

Causes of Chest Pain

There are many problems that can cause chest pain. The pain can range from a sharp stab to a dull ache. It can feel crushing, burning or tearing or can be like an ache or heavy feeling in the chest. Sometimes, the pain goes up the neck, and/or into the jaw. It can also go into the back or down one or both arms. The most serious causes can be life-threatening. They can often be treated successfully when diagnosed quickly. It's important to seek help right away.

Less Serious Causes

• Muscle Overuse. Chest pain can follow hard work-outs or activities (such as throwing a baseball). Lifting (such as weights) or upper body work (such as digging) can also cause it. This type of muscle soreness often increases with movement of the shoulders.
• Muscle Cramps. Most brief chest pain, lasting seconds to minutes, is from muscle cramps (often the ribs). These fleeting pains can also be caused by a pinched nerve. These chest wall pains are harmless. Brief muscle cramps are also the most common cause of recurrent chest pains.
• Coughing. Chest pain often happens with a hacking cough. Coughing can cause sore muscles in the chest wall, upper abdomen or diaphragm.
• Asthma. People with active asthma often have chest tightness. They may refer to this as chest pain. They also get chest pain when they have lots of coughing.
• Heartburn is due to reflux of stomach contents. It usually causes a burning pain under the lower sternum (breastbone).
• Caffeine. A rapid and pounding heart beat may feel like chest pain. Too much caffeine (in energy drinks, colas and coffee) is a common cause. Drugs taken for ADHD also can cause a fast heartbeat. So can illegal drugs, such as cocaine.

More Serious Causes

• Chest Wall Injury. Blunt trauma, such as falling onto something or a blow to the chest (thrown object or impact with another person during sports) usually just causes a bruised rib. Sometimes, it causes a broken rib (fracture). Pain from broken ribs may last for several weeks before starting to ease.
• Heart Disease (serious). Heart disease is a common cause of chest pain in adults. Chest pain that only occurs with exercise could have a cardiac (heart) cause. It is important to seek care right away if this happens. Life-saving treatment is important at this stage, before the condition gets worse and becomes life-threatening. Heart pain can also occur if the heart beat feels too fast, too slow or with an uneven beat. Sometimes a change in heart rate or rhythm only lasts for a few minutes and does not cause any other symptoms. But it can occur with dizziness, fainting, chest pain or breathing trouble. See your doctor if any of these occur.
• Pleurisy (serious) is an infection near the surface of the lung that causes pain as you take a breath. It can happen with pneumonia. If the infection involves the lung's surface, that area of the chest will hurt.
• Pulmonary Embolus (serious) occurs when a clot from somewhere in the body (often the legs) travels through the blood stream and gets trapped in the lungs. A large clot can be life-threatening. Symptoms include breathlessness, chest pain and coughing up blood.

Pain Scale

• Mild: you feel some pain, but it does not keep you from any normal activities. Work, activities and sleep are not changed.
• Moderate: the pain keeps you from doing some normal activities. It may wake you up from sleep.
• Severe: the pain is very bad. It keeps you from doing all normal activities.