The heart is one of the important organs of humans. The heart works tirelessly day and night, pumping blood throughout the body. Did you know that blood vessels are 100,000 kilometers long? Imagine your heart pumping all your blood through these blood vessels. Therefore, it is important to pay attention to the heart health so that it continues to work effectively and hopefully well into old age. There are many heart diseases that affect the function of the heart, one of which is heart failure.
Heart failure is a disease of the heart or heart structure that prevents the heart from pumping the blood needed by the body. It is estimated that there are 63.4 million people with heart failure worldwide. Heart failure is more than just the heart not functioning properly. This can be significant for a person’s disability and even death. After age 65, the risk of heart failure doubles for every 10 years of age for men, but triples for women.
Heart failure is often caused by coronary artery disease (CHD). CAD is a disease caused by plaque buildup on artery walls. Dental plaque is mainly composed of fat. These deposits cause the artery walls to narrow, ultimately affecting the blood supply to the heart. Other causes of heart failure include cardiomyopathy, inflammation of the heart muscle such as endocarditis, congenital heart disease, arrhythmias, and heart valve disease. Disorders that cause the heart to work harder than normal can also cause heart failure if treated. These include high blood pressure, kidney disease, diabetes, obesity, and poor lifestyle choices such as alcohol abuse and mental stress.
Most patients with heart failure are classified as having either systolic or diastolic dysfunction. The first, called systolic heart failure, occurs when the heart muscle cannot contract with enough force to pump blood throughout the bloodstream. The second condition, known as diastolic heart failure, occurs when the heart contracts normally but the ventricles do not relax properly or become stiff. As a result, less blood entered the heart during the normal blood-filling phase between heartbeats. To determine whether heart failure is systolic or diastolic dysfunction, doctors usually perform an echocardiogram to fully assess the heart’s pumping ability.
However, there is actually another form of heart failure called high-performance heart failure. This is also different from the one introduced earlier. Usually, the heart of a person with heart failure does not pump enough blood around the body. The opposite is true for people with high cardiac output, because the heart pumps out a normal amount of blood but cannot keep up with the body’s increased demand for blood. Eventually, the heart becomes weak and unable to pump blood effectively. As the name suggests, high-output heart failure is different from most types of heart failure because a person with high-output heart failure has a cardiac output of 8 liters per minute. Normal cardiac output is 5 to 6 liters of blood per minute.
There are many causes of high output heart failure. These include his high BMI (body mass index), severe anemia, sepsis, Paget’s disease, hyperthyroidism, pregnancy, liver disease, and lung disease. These diseases usually cause blood vessels to dilate to meet the body’s oxygen and blood needs. It may also be caused by a disease in which blood flows around the arterioles instead of flowing into them. This allows more blood to enter the veins and send the blood back to the heart instead of throughout the body. Eventually, your body will need more blood. This is especially true for patients with arteriovenous fistulas or shunts.
Symptoms of high-output heart failure are similar to other types of heart failure. These include shortness of breath, feeling tired even after resting, swelling of the lower extremities or abdomen, temporary rapid weight gain due to fluid accumulation, difficulty sleeping when lying down, swelling of the veins in the neck, and persistent This includes coughing.
Diagnosis of high-output heart failure is similar to diagnosis of other types of heart failure. Doctors first check for symptoms of heart failure by asking questions and taking a medical history. A physical exam will then be performed before further tests are performed. Typically, a medical professional will perform an electrocardiogram (ECG) test and blood tests. An echocardiogram, a type of ultrasound, is then usually performed to check for heart failure. Echocardiography is the most important test for diagnose heart failure because it shows the extent of the heart failure and whether specific treatment is needed. Because high-output heart failure can have many causes, your doctor may do special blood tests, such as: B. Test thyroid hormones and liver or kidney function to determine the cause.
