Congestive Heart Failure question.......?

I don't have it - but I work in a hospital (not medical personnel obviously) so I'm really curious. If your heart fails, you die. A LOT OF PEOPLE are diagnosed with Congestive Heart Failure (especially elderly) and survive a LONG time and still considered to have it years down the road....so if it's actual "heart failure" -- then how do people "live" with it?? If it's not really "failure" then why is it called that???? If you are diagnosed with "congestive heart failure" do doctors actually give you a certain amount of time to live?

Imagine that you buy a rubber ball. You bounce that rubber ball all day long, every day, for years. And it always bounces just as high as it did on the day you bought it -- that's the way a heart is supposed to work.

Now imagine that you have another ball, and you bounce it just as much as you did the first one. But after some time passes your ball begins to wear out, and it won't bounce as well as it did when it was new -- that's a heart going through heart failure.

For some reason -- bad diet, smoking, overweight, or (like me) born with a heart defect, the heart has a difficult time pumping. The blood doesn't go the body as efficiently as it once did. Fluid that would normally be screened out by the kidneys begins to collect in the body, which causes the heart to work even harder, which causes more fluid to collect in the body.... and it just keeps getting worse.

That's why heart failure patients have a pretty strict diet we have to follow. First, we can only drink 2000 milliliters of fluid per day. That's not really hard, that's a full two liter soda! But we also have to limit our sodium intake to less than 2000 milligrams per day. Sodium makes you retain fluid, which does not help the situation. Sodium, of course, is salt, but do you know how much 2000 milligrams is?

Go to the nearest fast food restaurant, and get two of those little packs of salt that they give you when you ask for extra salt. 2000 milligrams is about one and a half of those packs! Not fun at all!

So while we're controlling our liquids and our sodium, we also take diuretics. A diuretic is a pill that makes your kidneys work better... you guessed it, it makes you go pee!

Also, we check our weight every morning. Get up, go to the bathroom, then go weigh -- that's the routine. Keeping an eye on the weight is important, you can keep track of your internal fluids that way. If your weight is up more than three pounds in a 24 hour period, you are told to call your doctor. Usually they will tell you to take more diuretics for a day or so and that will solve the problem.

The medical statistics say that the average lifespan of someone diagnosed with heart failure is five years. Remember, that is an average... it takes into account all the people who find out they have heart failure after they are already sick with something else, too. I've been in heart failure for SIX years now, but I weigh 50 pounds less than when I was diagnosed, and I feel great! I might die tomorrow... but if I do, it will be because I accidentally stepped in front of a bus! :)

So a lot of it is the attitude of the patient -- if you decide "this is it!", you won't be here long. If you decide to get your act together, drop some weight, and follow the diet, you'll hang around for a while!

Hmmm.. I think its when you need a bipas operation maybe. I know you can have the bipas operation and live for a long time.

"failure" here refers to a rather lengthy process and syndrome over time where the heart is enlarging and the cardiac muscle is becoming less and less efficient at pumping blood. For example, a left ventricle constantly pumping against elevated blood pressure will become enlarged, less powerful, and eventually "fail" ---- but its a longer term process than what the word "failure" may seem to describe.

it is a sign that your heart is in trouble had a heart attack but can be controlled with medications and have to see a heart specialist congestive heart failure your lungs fill with fluid because you heart does not work well enough the person will need to be on diaretics and alot of other meds

Congestive Heart Failure (CHF) is the inability of the heart to pump adequate blood to meet the needs of the body. There are different categories of CHF according to the underlying cause. The CHF heart does not perform its optimal function, it's on the verge of failing hence the name. Patients have poor exercise tolerance, shortness of breath, easy fatigabiliy. There are different medications to help the heart pump out the blood or helps it relax so it does not overwork or causes abnormal heart rhythms. Patients with CHF have different longevity depending on how severe the condition is. They could live on for years.

I don't think so My mom went into heart failure in July and she is still in it . But she has gotten a little stronger than she was. She is 89 years old and doing good for her age. He never gave us a time he just said she had lived a good life.