heart attack

See synonyms for heart attack on Thesaurus.com
nounPathology.
  1. damage to an area of heart muscle that is deprived of oxygen, usually due to blockage of a diseased coronary artery, typically accompanied by chest pain radiating down one or both arms, the severity of the attack varying with the extent and location of the damage; myocardial infarction.

Origin of heart attack

1
First recorded in 1925–30

Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2024

How to use heart attack in a sentence

  • And isn't it great that your father has no more heart attacks?

    The Little Grey House | Marion Ames Taggart
  • He wa'n't very well, he said, subject to some kind of heart attacks, and had come to the Old Home for rest.

    The Depot Master | Joseph C. Lincoln
  • Snead might turn out to be a TK as well as a hallucinator, and I wanted no more heart attacks.

    Card Trick | Walter Bupp AKA Randall Garrett
  • She can swim like a fish, but shes had one or two little heart attacks lately, and she ought to keep quiet.

    Lola | Owen Davis
  • My mother, who had suffered from heart attacks during a great part of her life, died at 65.

British Dictionary definitions for heart attack

heart attack

noun
  1. any sudden severe instance of abnormal heart functioning, esp coronary thrombosis

Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Scientific definitions for heart attack

heart attack

  1. Necrosis of a region of the heart muscle caused by an interruption in the supply of blood to the heart, usually as a result of occlusion of a coronary artery resulting from coronary artery disease. Symptoms typically include sudden, crushing chest pain, nausea, and sweating. Characteristic changes in the electrocardiogram are used to diagnose heart attacks. Also called myocardial infarction

The American Heritage® Science Dictionary Copyright © 2011. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.

Cultural definitions for heart attack

heart attack

An episode of heart failure or the stopping of normal heart function; a coronary thrombosis. Symptoms of a heart attack include pain and pressure in the chest, which often spread to the shoulder, arm, and neck. Today, physicians tend to define heart attack in terms of muscle damage to the heart caused by oxygen deprivation.

The New Dictionary of Cultural Literacy, Third Edition Copyright © 2005 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. All rights reserved.