What is coronary artery disease?

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Coronary artery disease is the buildup of plaque in the coronary arteries that feed the heart muscle, leading to narrowing or blockage of blood flow. Plaques form from cholesterol, calcium, and inflammatory cells in the artery walls, which reduces the oxygen-rich blood reaching heart tissue, especially during exertion. This can cause chest discomfort or angina when the heart needs more blood, and if a plaque ruptures, a clot can form and fully block a vessel, triggering a heart attack. Risk factors include high LDL cholesterol, high blood pressure, diabetes, smoking, obesity, and family history. Treatments focus on improving blood flow and preventing events, using lifestyle changes, medications like statins and antiplatelets, and procedures such as angioplasty with stent or bypass surgery. The other descriptions point to different conditions: congenital absence of coronary arteries is a rare anomaly, inflammation of the pericardium is pericarditis, and excessive heart muscle growth is hypertrophy, not the plaque-driven narrowing that defines CAD.