What does heart-related chest pain feel like

By William R. Ladd, M.D., Director of Nuclear Cardiology
If you suffer chest pain, particularly while exercising, you will almost certainly wonder whether it might be heart-related - and well you should. Heart muscle pain - angina - is likely to be the first warning of blocked coronary arteries, the cause of most heart disease.
While there are no infallible guidelines about whether a chest pain is heart-related, it generally takes a particular form. Heart discomfort is rarely a sharp, stabbing pain. Even a heart attack may not be unbearably painful at first, permitting its victim to delay seeking treatment for as much as four to six hours after its onset. By then, the heart may have suffered irreversible damage. It is not unknown for patients to drive themselves to emergency rooms with what proved to be very serious and even fatal heart attacks.
Angina is a protest from the heart muscle that it isn't getting enough oxygen because of diminished blood supply. A heart attack is simply the most extreme state of oxygen deprivation, in which whole regions of heart muscle cells begin to die for lack of oxygen. If the blockage in the arteries serving the heart muscle can be cleared quickly enough - within the first few hours of the onset of the attack - the permanent damage can be held to a minimum.
Pain is the only warning you are likely to get of a potentially lethal condition. Ignoring this sort of pain can cause heart disease. Heed it! Consult a cardiologist immediately.