I've had several episodes over the last 1.5 yrs of tightness in my upper back and chest. I have had two stress tests (one nuclear, one standard) Echo, ECGs, etc.. everything came out great. I have normal blood pressure, do not smoke, am a little overweight for my frame.. 32 yrs old. My father had a heart attack and bypass when he was 46; but he was seriously overweight and a heavy smoker / high stress.

I called my doctor tonight and told him of this latest episode. He felt confident that it was not my heart and told me to take 3 advils. He told me that heart attacks dont' exhibit symptoms that last for 1-2 days.

I truly belive it's skeletal-muscular related but I am a worry-wart.

Anways, I guess my question is... Should I worry about this more.. should I put faith in the stress tests (the last one, the non-nuclear one) was back in May.

Would love to hear your advice,

Jim

Originally posted by James Rutter:

I called my doctor tonight and told him of this latest episode. He felt confident that it was not my heart and told me to take 3 advils. He told me that heart attacks dont' exhibit symptoms that last for 1-2 days.



Jim does the Advil help? For how long a time period does the chest tightness last? How often is it occuring? It is true that heart attacks don't exhibit symptoms that last for 1-2 days but from my experience although I was told I did not have a heart attack I was still experiencing symptoms of a heart attack. That was because I had blockage that did not show up on their tests. Therefore I was continuing to have chest tightness and upper back and shoulder pain. I was having vague symptoms as much as 2 yrs before everything came to a head.

Thanks for the response.

Its kind of weird. The first episode happened back in April of 2002. It happened after I had spent several (10-12) hours slumping over the computer. It was going on four about 3-4 days, and then after I went to the ER and had all the tests it vanished for about a year. It then happened again this part april or may, did the same thing.. went to ER.. everything A-OK. .etc.. Then went away until about 2 months ago then its been occuring more frequently.. I would say it lasts for 2-7 days.. then just vanishes for a while..

Also, something very weird.. if I go out and do physically active things (like today I was raking leaves) it went away completely.. it seems its more more noticeable if Im just walking or sitting. Also, it usually is not present first when I wake up in the morning.. it kind of eases throughout the day.

There is no associated pain other than back and chest tightness.

I get the feeling that my Doctor (who I really like, and is a very good doctor) is beginning to think Im a hypochondriac (sp?). I don't want to overblow this if its nothing to be concerned about.. I have normal blood pressure, EKGs,etc..

Thanks,

Jim

Jim if it was your heart causing the pain it probably would have brought on an attack of angina raking leaves. You might do a search on costochondritis. It is an inflammation of the cartilage of the rib cage and can become a chronic condition. It can start with a virus or also if you've had surgery to the upper body area.
If your doctor makes you feel like you can't tell him what is going on with your body without feeling like he's thinking hypochondria you may want to consider changing doctors.