The heart needs oxygenated blood to function, and the coronary circulation provides this by supplying the heart’s muscle tissue with oxygen and distributing blood. Narrowed or blocked coronary arteries can cause heart damage and need to be repaired immediately.
It’s easy to think of the heart as the organ that supplies all the other organs with blood. It helps circulate blood in the body so that all body tissues receive oxygenated blood. While the heart does this job, it’s just as easy to forget that the heart’s muscle tissue needs blood to thrive and function. Fortunately, the body has a solution to this: the coronary circulation. In essence, this describes the function of the coronary arteries and veins in keeping the heart muscle strong and healthy through oxygen exposure and blood distribution.
A simple explanation of the coronary circulation is hard to come by. Basically, most people have two coronary arteries, which are responsible for oxygenating all of the heart’s tissues. These provide the surface, muscles and walls of the heart structure and may have areas where they branch out or are thinner or larger depending on the structure provided. Both tend to arise from the aorta or valve that exits directly from the heart and sends oxygen-rich blood to the body, and are usually separated into the left and right coronary arteries.
Each artery (and in some cases, people have a third) is responsible for supplying part of the heart with oxygen. The heart must also have a mechanism to get rid of blood that is now low in oxygen after supplying the tissues. This is done through the coronary veins which carry blood away directly to the heart. It will then be pumped to the lungs for re-oxygenation before rejoining the coronary circulation.
Another way to think of coronary circulation is that oxygenated blood completes a circle inside the heart and just outside the heart. After blood reaches the aorta, a coronary artery takes some of it and redistributes it to the heart tissues. A coronary vein that captures and discharges blood directly into the right side of the heart for rapid travel to the lungs.
No matter how scientifically described, people should not underestimate the importance of the coronary circulation. Lack of oxygen to the tissues causes tissue to die, and when heart tissue begins to die, all types of heart function can be significantly impaired. Narrowed or blocked coronary arteries can create a constant source of heart damage and death of heart muscle or tissue, and need to be repaired immediately so your entire body functions better. It is therefore vital to maintain the coronary circulation of maximum possible function to maintain integrity in the organ that supplies oxygenated blood to the entire body.
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