A Guide to Congestive Heart Failure

March 25, 2016

Congestive Heart Failure (CHF) can be a scary and confusing diagnosis. Congestive heart failure has a number of causes including heart attacks, infections, and even genetics. Once you are diagnosed with congestive heart failure it is important that your alter your lifestyle to limit the impact that the disease has on your life. You may be stuck with congestive heart failure, but it doesn’t have to define your life.

Let’s start at the beginning. What is Congestive Heart Failure?

Your heart is a pump. It’s job is to pump old blood from your body to your lungs to be refreshed and then to pump it once again full of life giving oxygen out to your body so that each and every cell can be supplied. Congestive Heart Failure is the inability of the left side of your heart to pump an adequate amount of blood out to your body. Because your heart is weak and unable to pump all of it’s blood forward, some of it backs up. Blood backs up from where it came. In the case of the left side of your heart, blood is supplied for pumping out to your body from your lungs. So when your heart is unable to pump that entire load of blood forward it backs up into your lungs. The result is that your lungs become congested with blood and fluid. Thus the name “Congestive” heart failure. The congestion in your lungs makes you feel short of breath. The more you exert yourself, the more oxygen your body requires and the less able your heart it is supply it. That is why you may have a poor tolerance of activity if your CHF is not well controlled.

Heart failure, left untreated, can cause damage to other important organs. Each and every organ in your body requires a supply of oxygen and nutrients to do well. Your kidneys, your liver, your abdominal organs, and even your lungs must be supplied constantly with an adequate supply of oxygen rich blood. If your heart is unable to deliver that oxygen rich blood those vital organs will begin to fail over time.

Additional Resources:

Signs and Symptoms

Some of the signs and symptoms of heart failure may be easy to miss or to blame on other simpler issues. They include:

Feeling tired more often and with less exercise
Experiencing shortness of breath with less and less exertion
Unexplained weight gain – especially the appearance of being bloated
Cough without the presence of a cold or sinus infection

Resources to help you recognize the signs and symptoms of heart disease:

What Treatments are Available for Congestive Heart Failure?

Most treatment options for Congestive Heart Failure involve the use of various medications. Your physician will work closely with you to find the perfect combination of medications that help your heart to work better and help your body to demand less. Managing CHF requires a delicate balance between “taking the work load off the heart” and supplying enough oxygen and nutrients to the organs of the body. There are a couple of things you can do to make that job just a bit easier for your heart. We will discuss those a little later in the article.

There are invasive treatments for advanced congestive heart failure including heart transplantation and even the implantation of a pump that helps the heart push the blood along, but they are beyond the scope of this article. Let’s concentrate on some of the more common treatment options.

You may be prescribed a combination of the following medications to help with your heart failure.

Anticoagulants (commonly know as blood thinners) – they don’t actually “thin” the blood, but they prevent clot from happening. If your heart is not beating in an organized and strong manner, sometimes blood can remain in small pockets of the atrium and form blood clots. This increases your risk of stroke or blood clots in the lungs if they were to dislodge and travel there. If you are on a blood thinner you will most likely require regular blood tests to check your levels. You should be careful not to injure your self and pay attention to symptoms that may indicate internal bleeding such as dark stools.
Antiplatelet Agents – (Plavix) these medications also help with preventing blood clotting by inhibiting platelets that play an important role in forming blood clots.
ACE Inhibitors – Decrease the work that the heart has to do in order to pump blood around the body. They do this by dilating (making bigger) the blood vessels and decreasing the resistance that the heart has to pump against. They also help in keeping blood pressure under control.
Beta Blockers – used to take the “workload” off of the heart. They slow your heart rate and decrease the strength of contraction to allow your heart to pump needing less energy. These are used to control hypertension as well.
Calcium Channel Blockers – used to decrease the work load of the heart. They are also used to control arrhythmias (irregular heart rhythms). The most common in congestive heart failure is atrial fibrillation.
Statins – used to lower LDL (bad) cholesterol levels. They have also been shown to help raise HDL (good) cholesterol levels and lower triglycerides. All patients with any type of heart disease are generally prescribed a statin.
Digitalis Preparations – used to keep the heart rhythm regular with patients who have a problem with atrial fibrillation along with congestive heart failure.
Diuretics – cause the body to excrete excess water. This prevents the heart from becoming overloaded and backing up into the lungs causing symptoms of congestive heart failure, particularly shortness of breath. In addition, they prevent the build up of fluid in the body such as the legs and ankles.
Vasodilators (Nitroglycerin) – is given to reduce the amount of oxygen needed by the heart muscle and to dilate the coronary arteries to increase the amount of oxygen available to the heart muscle. Used to treat the pain of angina.

For more information regarding medications used to treat congestive heart failure:

Because you will be taking multiple medications at multiple times during the day it is essential that you develop a system that works for you. Perhaps purchasing a pill box that you can fill once a week and use each day. It is imperative that you be 100% compliant with your medication regimen. Each medication is designed not only to work with your body, but to work with each other to maximize your heart’s ability to pump blood. It can be dangerous to take your medications at wrong times or in wrong dosages.

Keeping your Heart Failure from Progressing

There are some relatively straight forward recommendations that may help to keep your congestive heart failure at bay. The first we have already dealt with. That is 100% compliance with medication.

Regular visits with both your PCP and your Cardiologist. Congestive Heart Failure must be monitored closely and any changes treated promptly. You should weight yourself at least weekly and any 3lb weight gain should be reported to your physician. It may be a result of your body retaining fluid.
Dietary Changes – If you are even slightly overweight, weight loss is imperative to prevent further damage to your heart muscle. The larger your body, the harder your already damaged heart has to work in order to supply much needed oxygen and nutrients. Even moderate weight loss can have an large impact on your congestive heart failure management.
Exercise – can be a challenge because of the symptoms of congestive heart failure. However, any increase in activity is of utmost importance. Simple things like parking far away from the store instead of looking for the closest place. Walking is a great low impact exercise for patients with congestive heart failure. If the weather doesn’t cooperate, or you don’t have a safe, level place to walk, try the local shopping mall. Many malls open early and even place distance markers to be used by people who utilize the mall for exercise. It’s a great way to meet people, have some fun and stay healthy too!
Avoid Fluid Overload – restricting fluid intake is important. Remember that too much fluid that the heart is unable to pump forward causes symptoms of congestive heart failure. The result is backup. It only stands to reason that if you decrease your fluid intake you can reduce the amount of fluid that your heart has to deal with.
Salt Intake – where there is salt there is water. If you have a lot of salt in your body, you will retain fluid. It is important to avoid foods with high salt content and to refrain from salting foods.
Smoking – an absolute no no!
Stay healthy – it takes a lot of energy for your body to fight off everyday illnesses like the flu virus. Be sure to stay current on flu and pneumonia vaccinations.

Additional resources to help with healthy life style changes in patient with Congestive Heart Failure:

Written by Guest Author David Patterson

Posted In:

Weight Management , Diet and Disease, Exercise and Physical Activity