As we’ve discussed on this blog previously, scoliosis is generally not considered a life-threatening condition. A curved spine can cause a great deal of pain and discomfort (among other complications), but cases where the patient’s very life is at risk are vanishingly few and far between.
Leaving out the risk of suicide – see Scoliosis and Depression – the only exceptions occur when scoliosis is allowed to progress to the point where the body is so distorted that vital organs can no longer function properly.
Can scoliosis affect your heart?
In the vast majority of cases, no. If your condition is closely monitored and treated in a timely manner, you should never come anywhere near the point where your scoliosis begins to cause heart problems.
Theoretically, however, scoliosis can affect the heart if the curvature goes untreated and progresses unabated over an extended period of time. A severely curved spine can distort the rib cage, and a severely distorted rib cage can leave the heart and lungs with too little room to beat / inflate.
Thus, heart failure is a possible outcome of severe progressive scoliosis – but again, it’s important to bear in mind that is an extremely rare occurrence.
Treat your scoliosis early!
The symptoms and complications associated with scoliosis vary enormously from one patient to the next – pain isn’t always proportional to the angle of one’s curve – but nevertheless, it’s always better to catch the condition early and seek treatment right away than to let it progress.
Here at the Scoliosis SOS Clinic, we provide non-surgical scoliosis therapy for patients of all ages and curves of all sizes. Here’s an example of a patient who came to us for early (almost pre-emptive) treatment after her older brother ended up requiring spinal fusion surgery:
Call Scoliosis SOS on 0207 488 4428 or use the links below to find out more about our ScolioGold treatment courses.
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