Welcome to the channel where medical topics are made easy.
In this video, I’m going to show you a simple way to remember the
main life-threatening causes of chest pain.
Many of you watching this video are probably aware, there are many conditions that can lead
to chest pain and you don’t want to miss those life-threatening or emergent causes.
So I wanted to come up with an easy way to remember the main emergent causes that
you can run through your head when you’re thinking about chest pain.
Just a quick reminder before we get started you can find the
lectures notes and study guides for the videos on our website linked down below.
So the easy way to remember some of the main life-threatening causes of chest pain
is to use what I call the 4-2-1 rule.
The way it works is there are 4 heart related emergencies that can cause chest pain,
2 lung related emergencies, and 1 esophageal related emergency.
Now here’s the cool part which makes it really easy to remember.
You can remember there are 4 heart related causes because there are 4 chambers in the heart,
you can remember there are 2 lung related causes because there are 2 lungs,
And there is one esophageal related cause because there is 1 esophagus.
Starting with the heart,
we said there are 4 heart related emergencies that can cause chest pain.
They include acute coronary syndrome or ACS,
which includes myocardial infarction and ischemic related causes.
Next is aortic dissection, which is when the inner layer of the aorta tears.
Next is pericarditis, which is inflammation of the pericardium or membrane sac around the heart,
and myocarditis which is inflammation of the heart muscle.
Finally, we have pericardial effusion,
which is the accumulation of extra fluid in the pericardium around the heart.
Or cardiac tamponade, which is compression of the
heart from too much fluid build up around the heart.
So the 4 heart related causes are ACS,
aortic dissection, pericarditis or myocarditis, and pericardial effusion or cardiac tamponade.
Next we have the lungs,
and we said there were 2 lung related emergencies that can cause chest pain.
The first one is pulmonary embolism or PE, which is a blockage in the arteries in the lungs
and the second one is a pneumothorax which is a collapsed lung.
So the 2 lung related causes are PE and pneumothorax.
Finally we said there is 1 esophageal related emergency that can cause chest pain.
This will help you remember esophageal perforation or rupture, which is a tear
or a hole in the esophagus and this can lead to food and fluid leaking out of the esophagus.
Now here’s the really cool part.
You can take the 4-2-1 rule to remember the main emergent causes of chest pain,
and combine that with the mnemonic “BREATHE”.
We came up the mnemonic “BREATHE” in a previous video to remember some of
the main emergent causes of shortness of breath.
And I’ll link that video down below.
The “B” stands for bacteria which will help you remember things like pneumonia or endocarditis.
“R” stands for reactive airway disease which is used to help you collectively
remember conditions that cause bronchospasm or wheezing such as asthma, COPD, or anaphylaxis.
“E” stands for embolism to help you remember pulmonary embolism.
“A” stands for acute coronary syndrome or ACS.
“T” will help you remember tension pneumothorax or cardiac tamponade.
The “H” stands for heart failure.
And the “E” will help you remember electrical excitation or arrhythmias,
along with pulmonary edema, pleural effusion, or empyema.
So you can see how the “BREATHE” mnemonic along with
the 4-2-1 rule provides a great way to remember
some of the main emergent causes of chest pain and shortness of breath.
It is important to note this is not a complete list of causes of chest
pain and shortness of breath, and there are other causes that can become emergent too,
but this a good list of some of the main ones.
You can see how many conditions can cause chest pain here.
It’s difficult to remember them all, so having a simple way to
remember some of the emergent causes using the 4-2-1 rule is very helpful.
Likewise we can see there are many conditions that can cause shortness of breath as well.
It’s difficult to remember all of these too, so having a simple way to remember
some of the main emergent causes using the mnemonic “BREATHE” is also helpful.
Here is a table I put together summarizing the 4-2-1 rule
that can be used to remember some of the main emergent causes of chest pain.
If you like this trick, make sure to share the video with others.
Remember there are 4 heart related causes, 2 lung related causes, and 1 esophageal related cause.
The heart related causes include ACS, aortic dissection, pericarditis or myocarditis,
and pericardial effusion or cardiac tamponade.
The lung related causes include pulmonary embolism and pneumothorax.
And the esophageal related cause includes esophageal perforation or rupture.
Hopefully this gave you a simple way to remember the main emergent causes of chest pain,
along with a good review of shortness of breath as well.
If you found the tricks useful, please share the video with others
and hit that like button and leave a comment down below if you want to see more.
You can find the lecture notes and study guides for the video on our website linked down below.
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Thanks for watching and hope you check out future videos.