Athletic Heart Syndrome (AHS)
Excessive exercise can put you at risk of athletic heart syndrome. protect the heart from stress of strenuous physical training.
Regular moderate exercise is of paramount importance to good health - for prevention of heart attacks, strokes, for better management of diabetes, hypertension, osteoporosis, sexual performances - but the flip side of excessive exercise training is athletic heart syndrome (AHS)
Causes :
AHS occurs due to hypertrophy of the heart muscle. Typically it is described as increased heart muscle mass, increased chamber dimensions and wall thickness. Generally, AHS is a far more efficient heart than a normal heart. It is accompanied by slow heart rate. The heart muscle hypertrophy is the same as seen in biceps or arm muscles after continued weight training. The muscle fibres of the heart increase in length, diameter and number with prolonged endurance training like long-distance running, dancing and sports. The muscles become thickened by pressure overloads like weight training, rowing, etc. These changes in heart have to be differentiated from pathological hypertrophy of the heart muscle.
Diagnosis :
Most athletes with AHS have no symptoms at all. It gets diagnosed by an abnormal ECG, X-ray and echocardiography. Most tests get normalised after some years of stopping the exercise. high-level training athletes should be aware of AHS. If breathlessness, graying (syncope), chest pains occur, they should be evaluated. AHS should not be a cause of concern to any employment. After cessation of athletic activity, most heart-related changes will regress to normal, over a period of months.
To Be Continued...
Source : TOI
