All you Need to Know About Murmur

There are many of us who might not know about the condition called murmur while there is a possibility that many of us consider it a heart condition or a hole in the heart. In fact, murmur is not any hole in the heart or heart condition, it is just a sound of the heart that comes between the ‘lub and dub’ sound of it. The murmur has a sound which is why people feel that there could be some abnormality associated around it. Apparently, most murmurs are benign and can occur in many children. Many pediatric cardiologists have also observed the same in a major chunk of children and call it a pathologic or abnormal heart sound due to a hole or a heart valve narrowing or some other issues.

The first time a murmur is heard is particularly when the infant becomes a toddler and can carry on till adult age. But, mostly as you grow older the sound becomes less and less noticeable and might disappear as well. But, even if it does not there is no cause of worry because it does not point towards any sort of abnormality.

Sometimes there may be a heart defect but no murmur while further-more there might be murmur which might just change to some new murmurs with age. Even the loud murmurs that we hear when a child is not well is very common and not life threatening or cause of worry.

General Symptoms
When the heart murmur is harmless or innocent, generally there are no visible symptoms for the same other than the sound of the murmur which is usual.

But if the murmur is accompanied with symptoms as follows, then definitely there is a cause to worry as it might as well be an indicator of an underlying heart problem.

• Unexplained weight gain or swelling
• Blue skin more importantly the lips and finger tips
• Chronic cough
• Enlarged Liver
• Lack of appetite and growth hindrance
• Dizziness and losing consciousness
• Chest Pain
• Sweating heavily even without exertion or very little exertion

Hence, if there you or your family member is facing such a condition it is advisable to consult your family physician for the same. The physician would further recommend you to consult a pediatric cardiologist if necessary. The process usually used by a cardiologist to determine the type or cause of murmur is known as echocardiography, if needed or an echocardiogram for heart evaluation. Further treatment would be based on the type of murmur normal or concerning.