CHF

February 13th, 2009 Filed Under Health

Living With Congestive Heart Failure (CHF)

Something that will really change your life in a hurry is a heart attack. This is particularly so if the heart attack is sufficiently serious that it damages a significant portion of the left ventricle. In that case the heart can not pump enough blood through your system to maintain your once “normal” body. You are now a victim of Congestive Heart Failure.

To understand what CHF is and how debilitating it can be, think of CHF as two phrases: “congestive” and “heart failure”. The “heart failure” part is pretty straight forward. For whatever reason, probably a blocked coronary artery called an occlusion, a part of the heart muscle was deprived of oxygen nourishing blood flow and consequently died. That part of the heart muscle no longer works. It no longer contracts to pump blood throughout he body. The result is a lesser amount of blood flowing through your system. That immediately leads to the “congestive” part of the phrase.

As blood is pumped through the body, it is pumped through the kidneys where it is cleansed of impurities and excess liquid. With less blood flowing through the system, less is cleansed, and less excess fluid is removed. The excess fluid that is not removed causes your ankles to swell and worse, your lungs to fill with liquid to the point that it becomes almost impossible to breath. You are in severe “congestion”.

Fortunately, through the use of medications such as captopril and carvedilol (ace inhibitors and beta blockers) it is possible to rehabilitate the remaining healthy heart muscle so that it pumps harder thus pushing more blood through the system. Another drug spironolactone, a weak diuretic, or furesomide, a stronger diuretic, can be used to force increased filtration through the kidneys thus helping to keep excess fluid levels in check and thus, keep “congestion” in check. These drugs, while they make life with CHF much more bearable, are not without consequence. They can cause liver and kidney problems if not properly balanced. For that reason it is a good idea to get a blood test every couple of months just to monitor certain specific kidney and liver functions for the maintenance of good health.

Aside from the daily regiment of drugs which must be taken like clockwork for the rest of your life, certain other life changes arise from suffering CHF. For one, because of the drugs you will probably need to have a pacemaker installed as a precaution. The coreg or carvedilol which is used to cause the heart muscle to contract more forcefully (a good thing) has a negative side effect: it causes the heart to beat more slowly. It is possible that the heart will slow to the point that you pass out. A pacemaker prevents that.

The other two big life changers as a result of CHF are restricting your liquid intake to no more than 2 liters of total liquid in a single day and that may be too much, and, radically changing your diet. Start with reducing your salt intake. Salt helps the body retain fluids, exactly what you do not want to do. So, gone are most prepared foods, sauces and soups. You probably don’t realize just how bland food can be without salt. Did you ever try eating pop-corn or a potato without salt?

Next, reduce cholesterol containing foods – those would be your meats and cheeses. Say good bye to cheeseburgers except for the occasional splurge (once every six months). Replace you dinners of steak or roasts with chicken and fish, vegetables and salads.

It may be life altering to have a heart attack so severe that it leads to CHF but the fact that I am alive to write about it is a testament to modern medicine.