NURS 6501N Week 3 CV Knowledge Check Answers

NURS 6501: Advanced Pathophysiology CV/Resp - Knowledge Check: Module 2 Answers Use these answers to study for the Midterm Scenario 1: Myocardial Infarction CC: “I woke up this morning at 6 a.m. with numbness in my left arm and pain in my chest. It feels tight right here (mid-sternal).” “My dad had a heart attack when he was 56-years-old and I am scared because I am 56-years-old.” HPI: Patient is a 56-year-old Caucasian male who presents to Express Hospital Emergency Department with a chief complaint of chest pain that radiates down his left arm. He states this started this morning and has been getting worse, pointing to the mid-sternal area, “it feels like an elephant is sitting on my chest and having a hard time breathing”. He rates the pain as 9/10. Nothing has made the pain better or worse. He denies any previous episode of chest pain. Denies nausea, or lightheadedness. Nitroglycerin 0.4 mg tablet sublingual x 1 which decreased pain to 7/10. Lipid panel reveals Total Cholesterol 424 mg/dl, high density lipoprotein (HDL) 26 mg/dl, Low Density Lipoprotein (LDL) 166 mg/dl, Triglycerides 702 mg/dl, Very Low-Density Lipoprotein (VLDL) 64 mg/dl His diagnosis is an acute inferior wall myocardial infarction. Questions: 1. Which cholesterol is considered the “good” cholesterol and what does it do? Answer: HDL is considered the good cholesterol because it collects excess cholesterol in the body cells and transports it to the liver where it is excreted in the body cells and transports it to the liver where it is excreted in the body. HDL carries 20-25% of total plasma cholesterol. 2. How does inflammation contribute to the development of atherosclerosis? Answer: Inflammation in the heart muscle caused by chronic inflammatory processes leads to mitochondrial damage that results in an increased free radical production that further activates the chronic inflammatory vicious cycle.