How cocaine can damage the heart

DOCTORS have long suspected that cocaine can damage the heart.

In 1999, the first large scale study to demonstrate the link showed that the risk of a heart attack is increased 24-fold for the first hour after taking cocaine.

Scientists at the Institute for Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease in Boston, identified 38 cocaine users who had suffered heart attacks.

Of these, 29 had no prior symptoms of heart disease, and their average age was only 44 about 17 years younger than the average heart attack patient.

Nine reported using cocaine within 60 minutes before their heart attack.Chief researcher Dr Murray Mittleman said: "Cocaine significantly increases the risk of heart attack in individuals who are otherwise at low risk."

Later research from the University of Buffalo, New York, suggested that regular cocaine use might be responsible for a quarter of non-fatal heart attacks among people under the age of 45 in the United States.

More than 10,000 people aged 18 to 45 were asked about lifetime cocaine use.

Regular cocaine users were found to be almost seven times more at risk of having a non-fatal heart attack than non-users.

Within this age group, one in four non-fatal heart attacks would not have occurred without cocaine.

Scientists are still trying to understand why cocaine is so damaging to the heart.

The drug is known to raise levels of certain neurotransmitters which increase heart rate, ventricular contraction and the heart's demand for oxygen.

Cocaine is also thought to constrict blood vessels.