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Physics Of Aortic Lesions

Categories: Uncategorized
Sources: Disturbances Of The Heart

Next in frequency to mitral insufficiency is aortic insufficiency,

which occurs most frequently in men. The cavity of the heart that is

most affected by this lesion is the left ventricle, which receives

blood both from the left auricle, and regurgitantly from the aorta.

This part of the heart, being the strongest muscular portion, is the

part most adapted to hypertrophy, and the hypertrophy with this

lesion is often en
rmous. For a long time this large muscular

section of the heart can overcome all difficulties of the aortic

insufficiency. The pulse, however, will always show the quickly lost

arterial pressure of every beat on account of the aorta losing its

pressure through the regurgitant flow of blood. Sooner or later,

from the impaired aortic tension causing a diminished or imperfect

flow of blood through the coronary arteries, impaired nutrition of

the heart muscle occurs. In other words, an intestinal or chronic

myocarditis or fibrosis develops, with perhaps later a fatty

degeneration. When this condition occurs, of course, the repair of

the heart is impossible.



This form of valvular lesion is the one that is most likely to cause

sudden death. In aortic regurgitation Nature causes the heart to

beat rapidly. Such a heart must never beat slowly, as the longer the

diastole prevails the more blood will regurgitate into the left

ventricle, and death may occur from sudden anemia of the base of the

brain. Such a heart may, of course, receive a sudden strain, or the

left ventricle may dilate, and yet serious myocarditis or fatty

degeneration may not have occurred.



The signs of lack of compensation are generally cardiac distress,

rapid heart, insufficiency of the systolic force of the left

ventricle, and therefore impaired peripheral circulation, a sluggish

return circulation, pendent edemas, and soon, with the left auricle

finding the left ventricle. insufficiently emptied, the damming back

of the blood is in broken compensation with the mitral lesions.



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