Congestive Heart Failure

[BigV]

My night was interrupted periodically by a trip to the bathroom. It was kind of an ordeal. Yank the cord out of the wall, disconnect the blood pressure cuff, leave the oxy meter dangling and beeping and then me and my new bff, Stan d'IV shuffled off to the toilet. They gave me strict instructions to pee into the graduated bottle so they could measure my output. It worked out. There was a lot of output. Back to the bed, I could connect the bp cuff and the oxygen meter on my own, but I didn't bother plugging in the IV machine. I just let it run on the battery and the nurse would plug it in when the next one came in. I wasn't really prepared/in shape to bend over and fight with the cord/outlet behind the bed. Screw that.

I did get to sleep in, which was nice. And all the nurses and technicians were nice. Apparently my attitude and outlook improved overnight as well as my ability to breathe easily. No longer did I feel as though I was being choked when I lay down or bent over. HUGE relief. Lots of people came and went, and I met the new doctor. He explained a few things that I'd heard before, like congestive heart failure. (!) For the medical community it means my heart was failing to deliver enough oxygenated blood to my body, simple enough. The *cause* of this failure, which is on a continuum, not just pass/fail, dictates the corrective action. Also, consequences of the heart failure produce symptoms that exacerbate the failure, and round and round in a vicious cycle.

Edema is a poster child for this. That is why everybody kept poking my ankles and shins. They were checking for the presence and degree of fluid retention. My ankles are just an easy place to check, my lungs and torso were where the problem was most noticeable to me, struggling to breathe. And that's why they wrung me out with that furosemide. Your heart (and mine) pumps your blood and every other fluid that moves. Weak heart pumping (heart failure) means this stuff doesn't get to your kidneys like it should, it accumulates, round and round, worse and worse.

That was the opening diagnosis, now the question was "why?". The weak pumping action could be caused by high blood pressure, guilty. It could be caused by other things, which I don't really understand sufficiently to be able to explain it here. It has to do with what part of the heart is weak, the right or left side, etc,. They figured it out though, and have mapped out a plan accordingly. As I said, I'm guilty of the high blood pressure, and am now (back) on my medicine for that. And there's another medicine for the strength of my heart. As well as more furosemide. The upshot is that my heart was being overtaxed and now the medicine is making it easier for it to do its job.

During the day, the ECG technician came in for my examination. It was extremely interesting. What she did was use the probe to show a movie of my heart, different places in my heart as it was beating. Then, she used the machine to draw on frames of the movie and measure the size of the chamber at its largest and then half a beat later at its smallest. By comparing the two sizes they're able to compute what's called the "ejection fraction" or EF. A healthy EF is between 50 and 70 percent, meaning on each beat, the heart pumps out between 50 and 70% of the blood that flows in. My EF is 35%. Yikes. This is considered a moderate degree of heart failure.

This was the main test that confirmed the early diagnosis and defined the initial treatment plan. I have medicine to reduce my blood pressure, the medicine to make my heart work more easily, aspirin as a blood thinner, etc. I've also been urged to limit my sodium intake, and limit my fluid intake. Keeping the fluid level low and lower makes it easier to pump my blood. Exercise as tolerated. And checkups. I guess I'm a grownup now that I have a cardiologist.

It was a scary experience but I am ON BOARD NOW.

[limey]

Originally Posted by BigV

My night was interrupted periodically by a trip to the bathroom. It was kind of an ordeal. Yank the cord out of the wall, disconnect the blood pressure cuff, leave the oxy meter dangling and beeping and then me and my new bff, Stan d'IV shuffled off to the toilet. They gave me strict instructions to pee into the graduated bottle so they could measure my output. It worked out. There was a lot of output. Back to the bed, I could connect the bp cuff and the oxygen meter on my own, but I didn't bother plugging in the IV machine. I just let it run on the battery and the nurse would plug it in when the next one came in. I wasn't really prepared/in shape to bend over and fight with the cord/outlet behind the bed. Screw that.

I did get to sleep in, which was nice. And all the nurses and technicians were nice. Apparently my attitude and outlook improved overnight as well as my ability to breathe easily. No longer did I feel as though I was being choked when I lay down or bent over. HUGE relief. Lots of people came and went, and I met the new doctor. He explained a few things that I'd heard before, like congestive heart failure. (!) For the medical community it means my heart was failing to deliver enough oxygenated blood to my body, simple enough. The *cause* of this failure, which is on a continuum, not just pass/fail, dictates the corrective action. Also, consequences of the heart failure produce symptoms that exacerbate the failure, and round and round in a vicious cycle.

Edema is a poster child for this. That is why everybody kept poking my ankles and shins. They were checking for the presence and degree of fluid retention. My ankles are just an easy place to check, my lungs and torso were where the problem was most noticeable to me, struggling to breathe. And that's why they wrung me out with that furosemide. Your heart (and mine) pumps your blood and every other fluid that moves. Weak heart pumping (heart failure) means this stuff doesn't get to your kidneys like it should, it accumulates, round and round, worse and worse.

That was the opening diagnosis, now the question was "why?". The weak pumping action could be caused by high blood pressure, guilty. It could be caused by other things, which I don't really understand sufficiently to be able to explain it here. It has to do with what part of the heart is weak, the right or left side, etc,. They figured it out though, and have mapped out a plan accordingly. As I said, I'm guilty of the high blood pressure, and am now (back) on my medicine for that. And there's another medicine for the strength of my heart. As well as more furosemide. The upshot is that my heart was being overtaxed and now the medicine is making it easier for it to do its job.

During the day, the ECG technician came in for my examination. It was extremely interesting. What she did was use the probe to show a movie of my heart, different places in my heart as it was beating. Then, she used the machine to draw on frames of the movie and measure the size of the chamber at its largest and then half a beat later at its smallest. By comparing the two sizes they're able to compute what's called the "ejection fraction" or EF. A healthy EF is between 50 and 70 percent, meaning on each beat, the heart pumps out between 50 and 70% of the blood that flows in. My EF is 35%. Yikes. This is considered a moderate degree of heart failure.

This was the main test that confirmed the early diagnosis and defined the initial treatment plan. I have medicine to reduce my blood pressure, the medicine to make my heart work more easily, aspirin as a blood thinner, etc. I've also been urged to limit my sodium intake, and limit my fluid intake. Keeping the fluid level low and lower makes it easier to pump my blood. Exercise as tolerated. And checkups. I guess I'm a grownup now that I have a cardiologist.

It was a scary experience but I am ON BOARD NOW.

Blimey! Keep taking the tablets, mate!

Sent from my SM-G935F using Tapatalk

[Griff]

Good luck brother, stick with the program.

[glatt]

Thanks for the detailed update. It's fascinating how all that stuff works together. Or doesn't.

I'm happy to hear you are on board now. In hindsight, it appears it was a mistake to stop taking the high blood pressure meds.

I hear about your experiences and think about how it might apply to my own situation. If I am ever told I should take high blood pressure medicine, I'm sure part of me would be weighing the cost vs. benefit of that. You're supposed to flip your mattress and rotate your tires. Brush your teeth. Oh, and try to get your medical numbers into the correct range. It's super easy to ignore things and not see immediate consequences. So why worry? But congestive heart failure is some scary shit.

[xoxoxoBruce]

It'll probably kill you, but if you follow instructions it will take a long long time. I've been on the program for years and it works. You'll feel better and get back to a pretty normal life. The worst thing you can do is get depressed about it. It's here, it's real, you can deal with it.