Wall of ventricle

Looks like

The thick muscular wall of a heart pumping chamber; the left one is about 1 cm thick, the right one much thinner.

What it does

Squeezes with each beat to push blood out: the right into the lungs, the left into the whole body.

Keeping it well

Long-standing high blood pressure thickens it; a heart attack scars it. Breathlessness and swollen ankles need a check and a heart ultrasound.

Related conditions

• 22q11.2 deletion syndrome (DiGeorge)
• Aortic stenosis
• Atrial flutter
• Cardiomyopathy (dilated, restrictive, arrhythmogenic)
• Chagas disease
• Congenital heart defects
• Coronary artery disease
• Diphtheria
• Down syndrome (trisomy 21)
• Eating disorders
• Extra heartbeats (ectopics and palpitations)
• Fainting (syncope)
• Friedreich's ataxia
• Heart failure
• High blood pressure
• High cholesterol
• Hypertrophic cardiomyopathy
• Hypothermia & frostbite
• Kawasaki disease
• Long QT syndrome
• Metabolic syndrome
• Myocarditis
• Orthostatic hypotension & POTS
• Panic disorder
• Pericardial effusion & tamponade
• Pericarditis
• Peripheral artery disease
• Phaeochromocytoma & hyperaldosteronism
• Pre-eclampsia
• Raynaud's phenomenon
• Sepsis
• Shock (circulatory failure)
• Sudden cardiac arrest
• Sudden infant death syndrome
• Supraventricular tachycardia
• Takotsubo (stress) cardiomyopathy
• Tuberous sclerosis complex
• Vasculitis (GCA & others)
• Wolff–Parkinson–White syndrome