What causes chest tightness after eating?

Some people will feel chest tightness after eating, and may also have symptoms such as difficulty breathing and shortness of breath. This is usually caused by heart problems. Overeating may also cause chest tightness. You should have a regular diet and eat small meals frequently. You can eat until you are 70% full each time. It is recommended not to overeat. You can take a walk or exercise after a meal to promote food digestion. What causes chest tightness after a full meal? Let’s take a look at it next.

1. What causes chest tightness after a full meal?

It is possible that you have coronary heart disease. When you eat too much, the gastrointestinal tract becomes congested and the blood supply to other parts of the body is reduced. This aggravates myocardial ischemia on the basis of the stenosis, hardening and spasm of the coronary arteries themselves, leading to palpitations and shortness of breath. It is best to go to the hospital for examination in time and receive symptomatic treatment after diagnosis.

2. Coronary ischemia and chest tightness

Chest tightness is a symptom that may occur in many diseases, but mainly in internal medicine diseases, the most common of which is cardiovascular disease. The incidence of sudden death from heart disease is higher in the cold winter, especially from December to February of the following year. In particular, the incidence of acute myocardial infarction increases significantly in continuous low temperature, rainy and windy weather. People in their forties and fifties should pay extra attention.

In the dead of winter, due to the stimulation of cold, the excitability of the body's sympathetic nervous system increases, and the secretion of fetal phenolamines in the body increases. The latter can cause the blood vessels in the limbs to contract, the heart rate to increase, the heart workload to increase, and the oxygen consumption to increase. At this time, the myocardium will suffer from ischemia and hypoxia, causing angina pectoris. Sympathetic nerve excitement and phenolamines themselves can also cause coronary artery spasm, blood concentration, and make platelets easily aggregate and form blood clots, which is also an important cause of myocardial infarction. In addition, because blood vessels contract at low temperatures, blood pressure is easily increased, which increases the burden on the heart, all of which may lead to sudden death from myocardial infarction.

3. Acute Myocardial Infarction

Acute myocardial infarction is often accompanied by severe chest pain. However, this is not always the case for the elderly, which generally refers to those over 65 years old. According to data analysis, nearly 1/3 of elderly patients with acute myocardial infarction will not experience severe chest pain, while chest tightness is the most common symptom. It can be seen from this that for the elderly, the presence or absence of chest pain should not be used as the main basis for identifying acute myocardial infarction.

Most patients with acute myocardial infarction will have precursors before the onset of the disease. When they feel chest tightness, pain behind the sternum, and sometimes radiating to the left shoulder and back, they must consider whether they have angina pectoris and go to the hospital for diagnosis and treatment in time.