Chest pain for over 5 months

[lclark53738]

I'm a 28 year old female. Never had any former health problems, not even a broken bone.

I've been having progressively worse chest pain for about 5 months now.  There is a constant pain that comes and goes, kind of in waves. And much more severe pain that I have come to call attacks. The pain is focused in the center of my chest but it feels like my lungs are cramped up. It's difficult to breath, I get light headed and sweaty. During the attacks, I have tried applying ice, heat, stretching, laying down, bending over, arms above my head...nothing helps.  I take 2 - 3 vicodin and these put me to sleep. At first the attacks lasted 15 min. Now they're 4 or 5 hours. Used to have 4 attacks a month, Feb I had 7.
I've been treated for heartburn, esophageal spasms, muscle spasms, and costochondritis. I've had blood work, chest xrays, ekgs, and a stress test done.  None of this has helped or found a solution.

Any suggestions or feedback is very much appreciated.

[lclark53738]

The only tests that have been done are the cardio tests: chest xray, about 10 ekgs, stress test, and blood work.  And pills pills pills...ER gave me antispasm meds (hyoscyamine) to see if i was having esophageal spasms, didn't help. Couple weeks after the first ER visit, I went to my first doctor appoint concerning the attacks. He prescribed muscle relaxers (baclofen) to see if I was having muscle spasms in my chest and Nexium for heartburn, no improvement. And most recently the Ibuprofen 3 times a day for 3 weeks for costochondritis. As I've said in my previous post...last month was by far the worst. 7 attacks and the pain in between attacks was worse. Pain is also spreading up to right above my collar bones during attacks.

But you still believe heart burn or acid reflux could be the cause of the pain?  Even with the changes to my eating habits and taking the Nexium for going on 3 months. I've never had heartburn before...does it usually just start so suddenly?

[lclark53738]

Because of the possibility of heartburn, I have been on Nexium since the end of Dec. I also don't eat a lot of spicy or fatty food or drink soda, I don't smoke or drink and I'm not a very stressed out person. After reading quite a bit about what could be causing this, I stopped eating a late night snack because I read it could trigger heartburn. And by snack, I mean, I ate some grapes or a handful of Cheezits or something a long those lines. So, with those changes, the pain is still here and is getting worse.  I'm not trying to prove you wrong, I'm just saying I've made changes to try and stop the attacks and it's not helping.  I also, for the past month, have been being treated for costchondritis. As I said before, pain has gotten worse and I don't think I have the symptoms I've read about with costochondritis.  The pain isn't brought from breathing, activity or replicated by pushing on my chest.

I will say that my grandmother just recently had triple bypass surgery and my mother passed away after having a heart attack at age 38.  Both have / had diabetes.

I'm wondering if I should be a bit more adamant about further testing with my doctor.  He seems to just being trying to medicate me to see if something helps.  I'm on a free health insurance provided by my county because I'm unemployed and I wonder if this is a factor as well.

[quadear]

wow this is not normal, i had simular attecks.This 1 night while having the attack i went to er, they put me in the hospital and did a procedure, a ultersound of my heart and arteries this is when they found a blockage, but before then i went months with this pain, i had ekgs done and all everything was normal! Sometimes ekg isnt good enough! you are having these attacks for a reason! read up on coronary heart disease