The American Heart Association has recommended that young patients who come in with heart attack-like symptoms - but don't have heart disease risk factors - should be screened for cocaine use.

"The drug can cause chest pains, shortness of breath, anxiety, palpitations, dizziness, nausea and heavy sweating - all symptoms of a heart attack. 'Not knowing what you are dealing with and giving the wrong therapies could mean death rather than benefit,' said Dr. James Reiffel, professor of clinical medicine at Columbia University Medical Center/New York Presbyterian Hospital."

Although the drug causes heart attack-like symptoms, it rarely causes actual heart attacks. The AHA statement goes on to say that young people with cocaine-associated chest pain should be monitored so they're not given potentially life-threatening medications. Source: San Mateo Daily Journal

Labels: cocaine, heart_attack, hospitals