If you want to know well about embolism and thrombus, you have to know about embolism vs thrombus. Sometime, people feel so confuse to distinguish them. Yes, they look similar, but different in certain condition. Read the explanation below to know more about embolism and thrombus.
Embolism
Embolism refers to obstacle in blood vessels. The obstacle refers to air bubble or blood clots. This condition will give serious problem to human, because it obstructs blood to not convey oxygen to heart. As we know that blood has a task to convey oxygen. But because of embolism, oxygen will not be conveyed by blood.
When blood can’t convey oxygen, there will be serious problem happen to important organs, such as brain, heart, and lungs. Those organs can’t work well without oxygen. Embolism can cause stroke and also pulmonary embolus. Even, the lack of oxygen can make some organs damage permanently.
Pulmonary embolism has some symptoms, such as hard to breathe, chest pain, blooding cough, headache, and rapid heartbeat. If embolism obstructs blood flow that conveys oxygen to brain, it will cause stroke. So, the symptoms of embolism also look like a symptom of stroke.
There are some causes of embolism, such as fat, blood clots, cholesterol, and air bubble. Emboli will also happen to pregnant people, overweight people, smoker, people with heart disease, old people, and people who have bad lifestyle. Read other information about embolism vs thrombus below.
Thrombus
Different from embolism, thrombus is blood clot formed on the wall of blood vessels or heart. This condition happens when platelets, blood cells and protein attach each other. Thrombus can obstruct all blood vessels. If the condition happens in artery, it will obstruct oxygen to reach tissues on that area. It is called as ischemia. If ischemia can’t be treated well, it can cause tissue damage, even fatalities. But if the condition happens in venous, it cause swelling and fluid accumulation.
As mentioned before, thrombus can obstruct all blood vessels in human body. Some common blood clots caused by thrombus are deep vein thrombus, pulmonary embolus, blood clots in brain artery, blood clots in heart artery, and many more.
So, what is the difference between embolism and thrombus? Actually, 95% cases of embolus are caused by thrombus. So, we can mention thrombus as the earlier condition that will lead to embolism. Embolism will be serious problem if the diameter of blood vessel is smaller than embolism. Hopefully, some information about embolism vs thrombus above will be useful for you.