Today a thought finally occurred about how to visualize the heart's muscle cells working. I read a book awhile back on "Chaos Theory", in which the heart was mentioned. I've always imagined chaos, chaotic, pertained to mass confusion or something like that. Different meaning, though, to scientists and theorists far above my level of learning! Muscle cells cause movement, but only in one direction. They are longish stretchy structures, though mighty tiny, as are all cells, and have the ability to shorten themselves. Bunches of them terminate at one of their ends in tendons attached to bones, usually near a joint. Thus the biceps muscle pulls our food to our mouths, which the triceps takes our hand away for another portion! Without one or the other, our arms could only be made to move one way. Heart muscle cells are not attached to bones or tendons. So how the heck can they make the heart pulse and squeeze as it does? About 9 billion of them, 3 billion being the actual "squeezers", the rest structural. Here's my thought. Everybody has seen in a movie, or perhaps in person, large clumps of seaweed, long strands, swaying in motion as the water passed by and through it. Picture it. Now, what if the seaweed were able to swing itself about in still water. Could the moving seaweed cause propulsion of the water? Now, if the seaweed strands were each shortening in length, in time with one another, making the water move, are they not doing the same work as heart muscle cells? Voila! NOW I see how the cells do it! The only remaining imponderable question to be answered is how are they individually told, commanded, billions of them, when to "shorten", in the same sequence over and over again, for a lifetime of service. During that time, very few of these "worker" cells are ever replaced. They last a lifetime! Most other cells of the body have very short lifetimes, comparatively, perhaps a month. Amazing when considering an adult human replaces about 20 billion cells daily! Science has recently determined that each individual heart muscle cell is commanded by nerve triggers, which are controlled through hormonal means, and if the sequencing of those billions of cells repeating their chore every several seconds, every heartbeat, loses it's order, we have atrial fibrillation, afib, a serious condition. Then, their motion has become chaotic. Frank
When speaking of the heart functions, what I can visualize is a pump. As per my learning in high school biology, the heart is the central processing unit of the blood. And what I understand is that the heart also cleanses the blood (I may be wrong on this). But with the heart muscles, I don't know where to place it except that I can feel my heart muscles tensing whenever I do tedious exercises or heavy physical activities.
@Corie Henson My intent is to try to provide insight into just how wonderful our physiological processes are, and to not mar their abilities by burdening them with bad habits. They all depend upon each other; hence, if the lungs are ruined by smoking, the heart becomes ruined by pumping ever-more blood to the lungs in an effort to keep the body's needs of oxygen supplied. Frank
Yep, we do ourselves harm with all our bad habits, if not for drugs and surgeries we'd be dead at a much earlier age but the bottom line is ...were all going to die anyway. Sooner or later. Add in things that can't be forseen like a car accident, shooting, natural disaster, terrorism, a brick falling on your head or walking off a cliff and it's all a crap shoot anyway.
The heart muscles are triggered by an electrical signal coming from the brain. Like all wiring problems if you have a bad connection you have an intermit signal this is the cause of most all A-fib. If you check out most people who have had this problem you will find they have lost height form went they were younger or had an accident. When this happens the space used by the nerves leaving the spine and going to the heart has been decreased in turn disrupting the flow of electricity to the heart. Lot of people find it is a positional problem noticing it when the lay down or reach up in the cupboard or even bending over. The spine at that point is pinching the nerve. I don’t know if you have ever hit the funny bone in your elbow but when that happens the hand usually is effected and stays that way for a short time. If you have a problem in the lower back like the sacroiliac and have no back pain but do have pain in the legs or feet. I have know people who have A-fib and with the use of a slant board and nutrition have no problem now. Some got relief by just take cold and then hot compresses on the spine area this is only a temporary relief as the problem was not addressed. Discs in the spine can regrow back to normal. In fact I have regrown ¼ inch in height in the past few years.
However, there are things that weaken the heart such as a virus, lupus, lead in the pipes, untreated thyroid disorder, etc. As in my case, i developed pregnancy induced cardiomyopathy. That is where the heart swells and the muscle becomes too weak to do its job. Fortunately, with rest and medication my heart condition resolved while others do not.
Well we owe it to ourselves to keep our pump in as good working order as possible. We certainly need it if we are going to live to a ripe old age. One thing was when my son was a baby and I had taken him to the doctor, the doctor, after listening to his heart, said he has a really strong heart. I bet he will live to be 110. I was thinking to myself I bet everybody will, by the time he is old! my son was born in 1988, and I would not be surpised at all if that is the average lifespan when he becomes elderly.
You can easily see when a woman is pregnant that biological changes that the baby inside is drawing off minerals and other things. The mother starts craving foods not normal also some minerals when deficient cause different ailments like chromium and diabetes or selenium with cardiomyopathy. The doctors in their wisdom misses this.
Most drs watch for diabetes in pregnancy also high blood pressure. It's become common practice now. I noticed it with my daughter and daughter in law. Not all women have cravings though, I didn't. I also didn't have morning sickness. Both pregnancies were pretty easy except when it came to the labor part. http://www.diabetes.org/diabetes-basics/gestational/