Why is the right side of my chest hurting
Right-Side CHEST PAIN (What it Means) 13 Causes
any chest pain can be concerning even
scary
but what if it's on the right side of
your chest is that
dangerous can you safely ignore that
no no this video is going to help you
understand right sided chest pain
and when to freak out and when to relax
most people think chest pain is only
dangerous if it's in the middle
or on the left side of your chest if it
radiates down your left arm
or if you're a man the truth is that
heart disease is the leading killer in
both men and women
and so everybody needs to take chest
pain
seriously and understand the different
kinds and what they mean
i'm dr ken berry a family physician with
20 years of clinical experience
six of those years being in the
emergency department
and so i think i can really help you
understand right sided
chest pain what's it mean and at the end
of this video i'm going to tell you
13 causes of right-sided chest pain
that will help you understand this
malady better any chest pain that's
sudden and severe
in onset you need to immediately
activate
emergency medical services if the chest
pain is accompanied by
shortness of breath by very fast heart
rate
by loss in consciousness or a change in
consciousness difficulty breathing
breakout in a cold sweat any of these
things you need to activate ems
immediately
and not take a chance on that but what
if you're just having
right-sided pain and none of these other
symptoms and maybe it's not too severe
what could it possibly
be here's the list of what your
right-sided chest pain could possibly be
number one is anxiety or a panic attack
if you've never had one of these before
then you're not really
aware of how severe they can be and how
much you can feel like
you're going to die they can be pain
anywhere in the chest but definitely in
the right side as well
if this is your first panic attack you
probably should activate
ems just to be certain if you've had
these panic attacks before then you may
be able to use some box breathing
or some cognitive behavioral therapy to
break your panic attack
uh medication is always a third option
number two is trauma if you
if you whacked yourself on the right
side of the chest yesterday
and now you're having pain in the right
side of your chest then yeah duh
it's probably from the trauma uh
traumatic
chest pain on the right side is usually
identifiable by being able to touch
where it hurts ooh it hurts right there
or if you cough or sneeze it hurts right
where you whacked yourself yesterday
that's that's probably something you can
ignore number three is a muscle strain
so if you did some
a really strenuous workout yesterday or
you moved your furniture
then you might have pulled a rib muscle
which can be exquisitely
painful again it's going to be
replicated by touching the area
or if you take a deep breath or cough
it's going to hurt right there
where you pull the muscle number four is
acid reflux or heartburn
typically you think this is going to
hurt right in the middle but it can hurt
on either side of your chest
and for people who've never had it
before it can for all the world
seem like a heart attack if this is your
first time having it you should probably
activate ems just to be
safe number five is a gallbladder attack
or a liver problem uh your gall your
liver
sits right underneath the right side of
your diaphragm
your gallbladder sits right underneath
that you can have exquisite
right chest or right shoulder pain from
a gallbladder or
liver issue some of these issues
are life-threatening and so if this pain
is severe
activate ems number six is pancreatitis
which is an inflammation or infection of
your pancreas
the pancreas is on the left upper side
of the abdomen but the tail does come
across
sometimes passing the midline and you
can sometimes have
pain in the right chest from an attack
of pancreatitis
obviously life-threatening activate ems
number seven is shingles
and so shingles is a is a reactivation
of the chickenpox virus
and you can have it anywhere on your
body but if you're having a flare-up of
shingles on the right side of your chest
it's going to follow your ribs kind of
all the way around it's going to be a
prickly burning
pain that you can sort of touch but not
really it's not dangerous
at all but it can mimic a much more
serious
uh inside the chest condition so i
wouldn't blame you if you activate
activated ems
for your first attack of shingles on the
right side of your chest
number eight is pleurisy this is an
inflammation usually sometimes an
infection
of the outer lining that covers your
your lung
uh this almost always is gonna hurt when
you take a deep breath or cough
when you're sitting very still and not
and holding your breath it usually
doesn't hurt very much
hard to tell if you're not a medical
professional so i wouldn't blame you if
you activated ems for your first flare
up of pleurisy
number nine is pneumonia if you have
pneumonia in your right lung you can
have quite severe
chest pain on the right side it's almost
always going to be accompanied by fever
and coughing productive sputum
shortness of breath ems is not out of
the question if you have pneumonia
number 10 is a pneumothorax this is
actually where
your lung collapses if your right lung
collapses
you're going to have severe pain and
immediate onset of shortness of breath
activate ems this is very common uh well
it's not very common it's very rare
actually but it's most common
in young men almost always it's someone
who's still
dumb enough to be still smoking so if
you're a smoker and you're a young guy
or if you're any any age or any gender
and you have immediate onset chest pain
and shortness of breath activate ems
number 11 is pericarditis or
myocarditis this is an inflammation or
an infection
in the lining of the muscle of your
heart
this is going to kind of come on slowly
usually after you've had a
upper respiratory infection and you can
have quite severe
shortness of breath chest pain it could
be on the right left or in the middle
ems should be activated if you have this
number 12 is a pulmonary
embolism and depending on which lung
this happens in
and how big the embolism is you can have
severe chest pain even on the right side
it's always going to be accompanied by
shortness of breath and an impending
feeling that you're going to die
and you might die if you don't activate
ems very quickly for a pulmonary
embolism
number 13 is castrocondritis
and this is a poorly understood
inflammation
of the cartilage and and the rib uh
matrix and it can be pretty severe pain
and if you've never had chest pain in
your life then you don't know really
what severe chest pain feels like
costochondritis can come after an upper
respiratory infection it can come after
uh the day after a hard day of working
moving boxes
working out but it's almost always
accompanied with
a very sharp very pointable you can say
oh it's right there
when i take a deep breath or cough or
touch it it hurts
that's probably castrochondritis i hope
this video has helped you understand
your right side of chest pain better
as an old er doctor i will again
caution you if in doubt activate
emergency medical services
even at 3 am as an er doctor i
never faulted someone for calling the
ambulance for having chest pain if it's
your first bout of chest pain you have
no idea
what's a heart attack what's a pulmonary
embolism what's a collapse long you
don't know
call ems and let your er doctor sort it
out and if they get upset with you for
activating ems
then that's his or her problem not yours
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even better this is dr barry i'll see
you next time
