about to give up

          Hi, Im a 19 year old male college student with severe chest pain that started exactly one year ago. The pains are almost always there and are very sharp. The pains are on the left side of my chest and run down my left arm and into my fingers. I have been to the emergency room 3 times, a GI doctor, my PCP several times, a thuerastic doctor twice, a muscular skeletal doctor, a chiropractor, and 3 cardiologists. I have had 6 ekg's, a cardiac echo, an MRI, a CT scan, a chest x-ray, I wore an event monitor for 2 weeks, got tested for gerd, and had a stress test done.

           Everything has come back normal except for a couple palpitations at the end with my stress test. I am 6-1, 160 in fairly good shape. Before this I would go to the gym every day and do heavy lifting.( a possible cause? the pain cannot be duplicated by pushing on my chest wall so the doctors have ruled out costro chondritus) I also got very sick a couple days before the pains began and I was dry heaving for several hours. (Possibly pulled muscles in my chest?)
             The chest pains are unbearable and no one can seem to give me any answers as to what is causing this. All my doctors just keep referring me to other doctors and my cardiologist won’t take me serious. I barely go out with my friends anymore and I am not looking forward to going back to school in a week, because it is across the state and I will be away from my doctors.

I just have a few questions in specific.

1. Can I rule out cardiac and if not what kind of cardiac problems could be causing this?
2. Should I ask my doctor to maybe just try heart pain relief medication and see if that helps me at all?
3. What else would cause chest pains with pain down my left arm?
4. What would be the best way to determine if I have pulled a muscle in my chest or damaged the muscular skeletal area?

       Thank you very much for any responses  
                         ~Brian

[Jack54]

Have you had any injuries to your spine?

[MysteryChemist]

I'm not a doctor but since 3 cardiologists have checked you out and found nothing wrong after EKGs, echo, event monitors,etc. it doesn't sound like it is a cardiac problem to me.

Could you be suffering from anxiety attacks? Anxiety attacks can be very painful and frightening.  Everybody has stress and anxiety in their lives. There are different ways to handle it. I had a major league anxiety attack when I was about 25 or 26  that scared the bejeesus out of me. I thought I was having a heart attack. I had to learn ways to defuse anxiety and stress.

Perhaps your PCP could refer you to a psychologist or perhaps one is available at your college? Colllege itself can be stressful time. There's no harm in learning techniques that can control stress and anxiety. You canuse these techniques through life.

Again, I am not a doctor. Just my 2 cents worth. Good luck!

[chest_pains_for_a_year]

i havent had any spine injuries, are you thinking that it could be a pinched nerve?

i am not an anxious person at all really and i highly doubt it is anxiety because even when im having a good time completely stress free, the chest pains will come. college is a very enjoyable time for me, with the exception of these chest pains.

[sunshine_31]

You are not alone. I have been suffering
From the same symptoms since childhooh. I am
30 years old and still without an answer.
I've taken anxiety meds, had heart cath
Done recently, several ekg, and echocardiogragms.
My mom was diagnosed 2 days ago with heart
Spasms. She had all the same symptoms as myself.
This was discoved only after doing a heart cath
And causing her immense chest pain/inducded
A mild heart attack. My question....how many
People have these spasms and go untreated?
You can only properly diagnose it if you do
A heart cath while it is happening.cheryl