Heart Failure in my Friend (17 yrs old)?

my friend was recently dignosed with stage 3 heart failure, his left ventricle isnt pumping properly. what will be the treatment and success rate for him, and for the future? he is only 17 years old. please tell me as much as you know regarding teenage heart failure. thank you

I've had heart failure since 1996 in my 20s. The best advice I can give from experience is not to believe all the statistics about life span. They are based on people being in their 60s and 70s. Really the best thing you can do is simply don't make him feel as if he is going to die tomorrow. Your attitude is more important than what the doctor says. With medication and watching the diet your friend will be fine. Besides one echo doesn't determine how the heart is functioning as a whole, because with heart failure you have bad days and good days. Some times the tests can say your heart has decreased in function and you can feel great. Other times it can show an increase in heart function and a person can feel like crap. If you really want to know more study for yourself but don't feel as if you can tell your friend what he should and should not do because you are not in his shoes, I am however. The worse thing you can do is make your friend feel as if he should feel sick all the time. Doesn't work that way. By the way as I've said I've had heart failure since 1996. The lowest my EF has been was 10%, the highest was 36% during that time. So he may never run a marathon, but he can still do most of the things he wants to do like go to college, get a job, date, marry and have children some day. His life is not over, he just has to adjust the way he plans to live it.

Once the heart failure gets to the worse stage possible, he will be put on a certain bypass machine that is portable and remain in the hospital until a heart transplant is done. If he is lucky and it never progresses to that, he will be on multiple medications, such as ace inhibitors and Coreg to help improve his cardiac function, along with diuretics. If these don't work he could get an IV pump that he can carry in a small bag that constantly delivers cardiac medication into his blood stream to help his heart function. Only his cardiologist could say what his particular success rate will be. He will also have to adjust his lifestyle, decrease salt intake, lose weight if over weight, plan to have frequent rest periods throughout the day, etc.

Sorry about your friend's situation. His best chance for the future is probably a heart transplant. I'm sure his doctors have discussed it with him and his family. Meanwhile he will probably be on several medications to assist the heart function. He will need to eat low sodium diet and try not to exert himself. The best thing you can do is be a friend and let him know that you are there for him no matter what. Try to keep his spirits up as this is very difficult.

Heart Failure impact to multy orgams systems like Lungs failure,brain failure,Pulmo failure and etc... so your friends be alerts because he may die any time. the way to protect him you have tell doctor or ask doctor have long he can live.
I suggest you pray to God for his safety and his life. It just my suggestion. God bless you, your friends and tour families.

The answers above are pretty much on. He could get a heart transplant, which sounds bad but at his age, he is probably in better shape than the older men .

Good luck and God bless.