Heart Inflammation What Is Heart Inflammation?
Heart is your
body’s natural reaction to an infection or injury to the heart. To protect your body, your white blood cells send chemicals that increase blood flow to the area. This can lead to redness, swelling, or pain. Inflammation can affect the lining of your heart or valves, the heart muscle, or the tissue around the heart. Inflammation in the heart can lead to other serious health problems, including an irregular heartbeat called an arrhythmia, heart failure, and coronary heart disease.
Many things can cause heart inflammation. Common causes include viral or bacterial infections and medical conditions such as diseases.
Heart inflammation can occur suddenly or progress slowly and may have severe symptoms or almost no symptoms. You may have different symptoms depending on the type of heart inflammation and how serious it is. The treatment your healthcare provider recommends may depend on whether you are diagnosed with inflammation of the lining of your heart or valves (endocarditis), the heart muscle itself (myocarditis), or the tissue around the heart (pericarditis). You may be treated with medicine, procedures, or possibly surgery.