How Do Yo Mend A Broken Heart???

  Time does not mend a broken heart as scientists find condition causes long-term damage 

  songwriters, poets and novelists have long mused over whether time truly heals everything. Charles Dickens toyed over whether the bitter Miss  Haversham would ever recover from being jilted at the altar, and for  many historians, Queen Victoria's black dress came to symbolise her  irreparable suffering over Prince Albert's death. But a new study has apparently put their agonising to bed and concluded that not even the clock can always mend a broken heart.   A team of medical researchers from the University of  Aberdeen have said that so-called "broken heart syndrome" can leave  physical scars that never recover. British Heart Foundation-funded study followed 52 patients  over four months, aged between 28 and 87, who suffered with what is  officially known as takotsubo syndrome. The little-known condition was first coined in Japan in 1990  and named after the native word for an octopus pot, which has a unique  shape that resembles a broken left ventricle. It is provoked when the heart muscle is suddenly "stunned",  causing the left ventricle to change shape, and is typically prompted by  "intense emotional or physical stress". It affects the heart's ability to pump blood and, according to the BHF, there remains no known medical cure.   Around 3,000 people per year in the UK suffer from the rare syndrome, which mostly affects women.      "This study has shown that in some patients who develop  takotsubo syndrome, various aspects of heart function remain abnormal  for up to four months afterwards," said BHF associate medical director,  Professor Metin Avkiran.      "Worryingly, these patients' hearts appear to show a form of  scarring, indicating that full recovery may take much longer, or indeed  may not occur, with current care. "This highlights the need to urgently find new and more effective treatments for this devastating condition." The team in Aberdeen used ultrasound and cardiac MRI scans to look at how their patients' hearts were functioning. The results showed that the syndrome permanently affected  the heart's pumping motion and delayed the "wringing" motion made by the  beating heart. The heart's squeezing motion was also affected, and parts of  the heart muscle suffered scarring, which affected its elasticity and  prevented it from contracting properly. Dr Dana Dawson, reader in cardiovascular medicine at the  University of Aberdeen, who led the research, said: "We used to think  that people who suffered from takotsubo cardiomyopathy would fully  recover, without medical intervention. "Here we've shown that this disease has much longer lasting damaging effects on the hearts of those who suffer from it." Figures show that between three per cent and 17 per cent of sufferers die within five years of diagnosis.      Around  90 per cent are female and the stressful trigger - often associated  with the sudden death of a loved one - is identified in around 70 per  cent of cases.      In the majority of cases however, the left ventricle returns to normal over a few days, weeks or months.   Clinicians  will usually follow up with regular echocardiograms, and unless a  patient has an underlying heart problem, no further treatment is  necessary. The BHF says more research is needed to establish whether takotsubo cardiomyopathy can be passed down through family. Journalists speculated whether actress Debbie Reynolds's  death in December - one day after her daughter Carrie Fisher of Star  Wars fame - was caused by a broken heart. Son Todd Fisher, however, said she just wanted to be with her daughter. The study is published today in the Journal of the American Society of Echocardiography.     Guys you can follow me here for more...