Coronary artery disease is considered to be the leading killer disease in America. Coronary artery is the major blood vessel that supplies blood to the heart and due to repeated deposits of fatty substances on the blood vessel it gets blocked due to plaque formation. There will not be normal blood flow on the arteries leading to heart attack or stroke. This condition of plaque formation on the arteries is called arthrosclerosis causing intense blockage.
How does it happen?
Coronary artery disease does not develop overnight but it occurs as a process. A high level of cholesterol in the blood poses risk leading to the formation of plaque like matter on the blood vessel. High cholesterol can develop due to obesity, lack of exercise, wrong diet, and unhealthy food habits. Blood cholesterol has two types of lipoprotein namely Low Density Lipoprotein LDL (bad cholesterol) and High Density Lipoprotein HDL (called as good cholesterol). The piling up of plaque occurs when there is excess of LDL and also due to low level of HDL. This condition occurs due to number of factors including high blood pressure, smoking and obesity.
Gradually the blood vessel gets narrowed due to repeated deposits of cholesterol thus interrupting the normal blood flow. As a result the heart may not receive the vital nutrients like oxygen and other substances. The plague like particles would subsequently make the inner walls of the artery sticky thus facilitating other particles like calcium and lipoproteins to stick on to it thus blocking the vessel still more. To rectify this condition the artery will develop new blood vessel to restore proper blood supply to the heart. However this blood vessel may not be able to manage high input of blood at the time of stress forming blood clots leading to heart attack/ischemia or hemorrhagic stroke. Since the entire process of plaque formation takes years together, unless a person gets heart attack or stroke, it goes totally unnoticed.