When heart enzymes are elevated is that permanent damage to the heart muscle?

I think I came across an article which indicated minor damage can be repaired if you give your heart a break and don’t stress it too much. The key was in resting it a bit, which is easy for an arm or a leg, but trickier with the heart.

No, not necessarily.

Scaring and tissue death will happen after muscle cells experience some profound damage this results in the tissue releasing certain enzymes.

http://www.ehow.com/about_5474854_mean-cardiac-enzyme-levels-elevated.html

Know your enzymes. Need more information, but it is better to talk to your own doctor about these things. Your doctor needs to be aware of your concerns and what you know and don’t know and what you want to know. Rarebear managed to answer the question without answer the question….. hmmm…

@Rarebear I assume eventually the heart enzymes go back to normal in the blood whether there is damage or not, so is the only way to know for sure is to do testing like an echo and EKG, and see if there are changes?

@JLeslie Pretty much, yes. It’s more complicated than that, but basically you are correct.

The enzymes are released during the time of initial injury, so they do go back to normal. The only way to really see the area of the heart that is damaged is through further tests.

I remember well, the last year of school, my father had a heart attack. At the University Hospital, they were able to identify not just the damage from the most recent heart attack, but one prior that had been misdiagnosed at pleurisy.

@Rarebear Ok, two last questions, is it pretty much assumed that heart enzymes can be slightly elevated at any given time, that it is a fairly normal and regular occurence? The second question is can extreme exertion cause elevated levels in blood? Like pushing oneself aerobic or anaerobically?

@cazzie FYI the enzymes sometimes take a while to enter into the blood stream, they trickle in slowly from what I understand, and it is the second blood test 6–8 hours later that really tells the story, if the enzymes have continued to rise, or are leveling off and decreasing. Something like that. If it is a big event, an obvious MI that registers on EKG and other measures, that is a different story of course. I just know any time I have been observed because of chest pain coupled with elevated heart enzymes, they always do a second blood test. I’ve never had a heart attack.

@JLeslie No and no. Heart enzyme elevations are always abnormal, but they aren’t necessarily a result of permanent damage. Exercise won’t do it unless your exercise is leading to cardiac ischemia.

@Rarebear Ok, thanks very much :).

I think that you touched the answer to your question. Permanent cardiac muscle damage would depend on the severity of the damage. A very slight increase in cardiac markers (CK-MB, Traponin I, Myoglobin, CRP) would indicate slight cardiac muscle damage as well as a more of a chance for complete recovery. If large area(s) of the cardiac muscle die do to lack of oxygenated blood then then of course the cardiac markers would be dramatically increase as well as the likelihood of permanent damage.

Another aspect of this for your consideration is that cardiac muscle has only recently been shown to have some slight ability for regeneration. That ability no doubt is dependent on how healthy and strong the patient is as well how willing the patient is to make healthy lifestyle adjustments following the heart attack. Contrast this to our skeletal muscle’s robust capacity for repair and regeneration.

What I find odd, is one time I went to the hospital for chest pain, it wound up being digestive which was later cured, but anyway, they kept me for observation because my cardiac enzymes were elevated. And a week later I had a stress test. This was many years ago.

A couple of months ago I was in a bad accident and took a big brunt of the impact on my chest, so of course when asked I responded yes for chest pain, and when they ran cardiac enzymes I was elevated again. The trauma of th accident I guess can explain the latter example.

It makes me wonder if my cardiac enzymes were tested routinely if they are elevated more often than would be suspected. Or, if it might be true in general for thers, just not routineoy checked, which is why I had asked that question of @Rarebear. Sometimes medicine doesn’t know because it has never been tested, there are just assumptions made, but it seemed by @Rarebear‘s answer medicine does know and it would be very odd to find elevated cardiac enzymes without some sort of trauma.

Cardiac markers are simply tools that doctors use to help them see what is happening to their patients. There is no perfect test that will tell the doctor without a doubt that the patient just had MI. Doctors are hopefully aware that an elevated Troponin (or CK-MB, or Myoglobin) alone does not necessarily mean that the patient has recently had a MI. The doctor must asses the entire patient situation.

Our bodies are made up of very complex systems that are not completely understood and we are all a little different.

For some reason when marathon runners train hard and tear down the skeletal muscle tissue in their legs their body tends to rebuild the damage muscle so that it is like cardiac muscle. This is why an experienced long distance runner could present high levels of CK-MB after a marathon. This has caused confusion for ED doctors when a marathon runner show up.

Also beside MI’s, elevated troponin levels can be seen in such conditions as acute pulmonary embolism, shock and renal failure.

@gondwanalon Thanks.

I doubt it is connected, but I have muscle trouble all over my body, and your explanation above just made me wonder if I have some other whacky numbers related to muscles. I have been seen by a neurologist, but later found out there may have been one more specialized that I could have seen in the same office, and I was so annoyed I never went back, because it had taken me over 5 years to bother to see him, because I have no confidence anything will be diagnosed or helped. Anyway, I was told I was normal, which simply isn’t true, but I am understanding of the fact that medicine may not know what is wrong with me. I wanted the neurologist to test me when my muscles were hurting and fatigued, and he said it would not make a difference, but I still think it might.