Answer to patient’s concerns: I got emotional and my heart hurt after walking for a while. Is this serious?

1. You must change the concept that angina pectoris is pain in the precordial area; angina pectoris may indeed be pain in the precordial area; but it may also be chest pain, headache, toothache, back pain, shoulder pain, upper abdominal pain; angina pectoris may not even be painful, and may also manifest as tightness of the throat, chest tightness and shortness of breath, sweating, the urge to defecate, etc.
2. Since we cannot judge from the symptoms, we can only rely on other characteristics: time - angina usually lasts 2-15 minutes; as we said above, pain of a few seconds is definitely not angina pectoris; of course, if it exceeds 20 minutes, or even several hours of discomfort is generally not angina pectoris; unless it is a very serious myocardial infarction; because myocardial infarction is angina pectoris that lasts more than 20 minutes.

3. Angina pectoris often occurs after activities, labor, exercise, eating, straining during bowel movements, etc. In simple terms, angina pectoris is more likely to occur when you exert yourself and your heart beats faster; it can be relieved by resting for a few minutes.

4. Angina pectoris comes and goes as it pleases. In simple terms, it suddenly becomes uncomfortable, especially when the heartbeat speeds up after exertion as mentioned above; but it is fine after a few minutes of rest. After it is fine, it feels much better like a normal person, as if nothing happened. These types should be highly suspected