How Your Heart Works
Your heart is the most important organ in your body. It pumps your blood, keeps you feeling vibrant and strong, and needs to be well taken care of. Many people understand that the heart is an important organ. They may add exercise into their lives, lose weight to take stress off of their heart, or change their diets to include many more heart healthy foods that can increase the likelihood of good heart health in the future. However, very few people know how the heart really works. Here is a breakdown of your heart, how it works, and what it does for you.
A normal, healthy heart is the size of a person’s closed fist. It is a pump made out of tough muscle tissue. The heart works hard to pump blood throughout your body. There are four chambers in everyone’s heart. In the upper side of the heart you will find the right atrium and the left atrium. On the bottom there are the right ventricle and left ventricle. Blood is able to be pumped throughout all four of these chambers, and the pumping action is aided by four heart valves, which are extremely important to the function of your heart. The valves open and close to allow the blood to flow only in one direction to keep everything moving well.
The four heart valves located in your heart all have different names.
- The tricuspid valve is located between the right ventricle and the right atrium
- The pulmonary (pulmonic) valve is located between the right ventricle and the pulmonary artery.
- The mitral valve is between the left atrium and the left ventricle.
- The aortic valve is located between the left ventricle and the aorta.
Blood that is low in oxygen will have a dark blue color. This blood is directed back to the heart after it makes its way around your entire body. It moves through the veins that are located all over your body and enters your heart in the right atrium. This chamber will then take that blood move it into the right ventricle through the tricuspid valve.
From there, your heart continues to work hard! It will pump the blood with a low pressure stream from the pulmonary valve to the pulmonary artery. Then your blood is transferred to your lungs. While in your lungs, the blood is filled with oxygen. At this point, after oxygen is added to your blood, the color will change to a bright red. Most people do not realize that originally blood starts out as a dark color, and only becomes bright red after the oxygenation process occurs. Then the blood is taken to the mitral valve and flows into the left ventricle. The left ventricle then pumps your blood through the aortic valve into the aorta. The aorta’s all-important job is to move the blood into your body so it can circulate properly. When your doctor takes your blood pressure, they are measuring the pressure from your left ventricle.
Clearly, your heart is working hard to make many specific processes happen throughout your body. Take care of it, and it should serve you well.