Angina

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In medicine, angina is the "symptom of paroxysmal pain consequent to myocardial ischemia usually of distinctive character, location and radiation. It is thought to be provoked by a transient stressful situation during which the oxygen requirements of the myocardium exceed that supplied by the coronary circulation."^[1]

Angina may be a symptom of coronary heart disease.

Angina has three characteristics:^[2]

1. "Substernal chest discomfort with a characteristic quality and duration that is"
2. "provoked by exertion or emotional stress"
3. "relieved by rest or nitroglycerin"

Based on the number of these characteristics that a patient's chest pain has, the angina is further categorized as:^[2]

• Typical angina has all three characteristics
• Atypical angina has two of the three
• Nonangina chest pain has only one of the three

Angina that occurs at rest, originally described by Prinzmetal, is now considered a variant form. ^[3] Subsequently, the term Prinzmetal angina is now regarded as a subset of coronary artery vasospasm^[4]

The probability of underlying coronary heart disease can then be estimated (see table).^[5][6][7]

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