Bread And Grains: Choose 6 Or More Servings Per Day
- Low-sodium whole-grain breads, rolls, bagels and cereals .
- 1/2 cup whole-wheat pasta .
- 1/2 cup brown rice.
- Low-sodium whole-grain crackers .
- 3 cups low-sodium popcorn.
- 1 cup fresh fruit.
- 1/4 cup unsalted nuts.
Note: For a diet in which you consume 2,000 mg of sodium per day, a sample plan might involve eating 500 mg at breakfast, 250 mg for snacks twice daily, 500 mg for lunch and 500 mg for dinner.
It takes about three to six weeks for your tastebuds to start to adjust and stop missing the salt so much, notes Taylor. Stick with it and allow your body to get used to your new food choices. Instead of focusing on all the foods to avoid, focus on all the healthy foods you should be eating. Your grocery cart should look like you just came from the farmers market full of actual foods, not just products.
Why Do I Need To Limit My Sodium
Limiting sodium in your diet can help minimize the amount of extra fluid around your heart and lungs and in your legs. Extra fluid in your body makes your heart work harder and can increase your blood pressure.
Keep in mind that salt and sodium arent the same things, though. Salt is a combination of sodium and chloride, and a teaspoon of salt equals 2,300 milligrams of sodium. While sea salt and kosher salt are less processed than ordinary table salt, they arent low in sodium. The amount of sodium is about the same for table salt and sea salt.
What Causes Heart Failure
Although the risk of heart failure doesnt change as you get older, youre more likely to have heart failure when youre older.
Many medical conditions that damage the heart muscle can cause heart failure. Common conditions include:
- Tobacco and recreational drug use.
- Medications. Some drugs used to fight cancer can lead to heart failure.
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What Is The Outlook For People With Heart Failure
With the right care, heart failure may not stop you from doing the things you enjoy. Your prognosis or outlook for the future will depend on how well your heart muscle is functioning, your symptoms, and how well you respond to and follow your treatment plan.
Everyone with a long-term illness, such as heart failure, should discuss their desires for extended medical care with their doctor and family. An “advance directive” or “living will” is one way to let everyone know your wishes. A living will expresses your desires about the use of medical treatments to prolong your life. This document is prepared while you are fully competent in case you are unable to make these decisions at a later time.
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Eko And Mayo Clinic Prove Heart Failure Is Detectable At Point Of Care Using Ecg
Study data presented at AHA show Eko DUO combined with advanced artificial intelligence algorithm effectively identifies low ejection fraction in patients
November 21, 2019 At the American Heart Association Scientific Sessions 2019, Eko, a digital health company applying artificial intelligence and machine learning in the fight against heart disease, presented results in collaboration with Mayo Clinic demonstrating the use of the DUO digital stethoscope as a heart failure screening tool.
When tested on 100 patients, the DUO combined with an AI model was able to detect ejection fraction < 35 percent with an area under the curve of 0.90, which is comparable to previously published research in Nature Medicine. These findings could help identify patients with a low ejection fraction during routine physical examinations, facilitating rapid clinical recognition of those requiring further testing. This marks the first time that a point of care device with a single lead ECG combined with an AI algorithm identified low ejection fraction in patients.
Ejection fraction is an important method of mortality prediction among cardiac patients and a low ejection fraction number suggests problems with the hearts pumping function, and may be associated with heart failure. An estimated 6.2 million Americans suffer from heart failure, according to federal statistics. The American Heart Association predicts that more than eight million will have the condition by 2030.
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How Sodium Affects Heart Health
Sodium is a mineral and its naturally found in foods. But its added to processed foods, too. While sodium helps keep a normal balance of fluid in your body, those living with heart failure need to follow a low-sodium diet because it helps control symptoms and can prevent other heart problems.
A low-sodium diet can help control blood volume and blood pressure. Excess sodium intake can lead to fluid retention, explains Taylor. Since people with heart failure often suffer from volume overload , a diet low in sodium can help lessen fluid retention, meaning the heart doesnt have to work so hard.
High blood pressure can increase your risk for stroke, kidney disease and heart disease, like heart failure. Following a low-sodium diet can help improve blood pressure control, which can reduce your risk of these diseases from developing or worsening.
How To Read Food Labels
Food labels are standardized by the U.S. governments National Labeling and Education Act . If you look at the food label below, youll notice that theres a section that tells you how much sodium is in a serving of food. Pay attention to the following:
A. The sodium content is listed on the food label per serving size.
B. Ignore the % daily value and focus on the amount of mg sodium per serving.
You might also notice that some products are labeled Low sodium or No sodium. Low sodium means that food has 140 mg or less of sodium per serving. No sodium means that food has less than 5 mg of sodium per serving.
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Prognosis At Different Ages
In general, younger people diagnosed with CHF tend to have a better outlook than older people.
A report averaging several smaller studies found that people under age 65 generally had a 5-year survival rate of 78.8 percent following CHF diagnosis. The same report found that people over age 75 had an average 5-year survival rate of 49.5 percent following diagnosis.
Older people diagnosed with CHF may already have other chronic health conditions. This can make it difficult to manage CHF and create a more challenging outlook for them.
for congestive heart failure. The treatment thats best for you will depend on:
- your overall health
- any other health conditions you have
- how you respond to any medications
- what stage of CHF you have
Common options include:
There are lifestyle changes a person with CHF can make that have been shown to help slow the conditions progression. Talk with your doctor before making changes to your diet or starting an exercise routine.
How Is Heart Failure Treated
Your treatment will depend on the type of heart failure you have and, in part, what caused it. Medications and lifestyle behaviors are part of every treatment plan. Your healthcare provider will talk to you about the best treatment plan for you. Treatment is the same, regardless of gender.
As heart failure gets worse, your heart muscle pumps less blood to your organs, and you move toward the next stage of heart failure. Since you cant move backward through the heart failure stages, the goal of treatment is to keep you from moving forward through the stages or to slow down the progression of your heart failure.
Stage A treatment
The usual treatment plan for people with Stage A heart failure includes:
- Regular exercise, being active, walking every day.
- Stopping the use of tobacco products.
- Treatment for high blood pressure .
- Treatment for high cholesterol.
- Not drinking alcohol or using recreational drugs.
- Angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitor or an angiotensin II receptor blocker if you have coronary artery disease, diabetes, high blood pressure, or other vascular or cardiac conditions.
- Beta-blocker if you have high blood pressure.
Stage B treatment
The usual treatment plan for people with Stage B heart failure includes:
Stage C treatment
The usual treatment plan for people with Stage C HF-rEF includes:
If the treatment causes your symptoms to get better or stop, you still need to continue treatment to slow the progression to Stage D.
Stage D treatment
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Rationale For A Multidisciplinary Approach
Cardiovascular complications from cancer therapy have become a leading cause of morbidity and mortality in cancer survivors . Anticancer therapies have extended the lives of patients with cancer, but for some at the cost of adverse cardiovascular events . Increasing age, underlying heart disease and other comorbidities are contributing factors. Moreover, a variety of cardiovascular scenarios can occur in this population. For patients with an advanced metastatic tumor, the development of heart failure compromises their quality of life and palliative care. In contrast, for patients with a high likelihood of cure, chemotherapy-induced heart failure significantly impacts their long-term outcome . Additionally, we are often confronted with challenging decisions on drug therapies beforehand based on the curative benefit on the one hand and cardiotoxicity risk on the other hand in patients with significant cardiovascular risk factors. These challenges have advocated the compelling need for the multidisciplinary integrative approach of cardio-oncology . Cardio-oncology aims not only to detect and manage cardiotoxicity but also to assist in the overall care of cancer patients with and without heart disease in an interdisciplinary manner that ranges from the initial assessment of cardiovascular diseases and cardiotoxic risks to survivorship and long-term follow-up.
Fig. 1
What Is The Outlook With Heart Failure
With the right care, congestive heart failure wont stop you from doing the things you enjoy. Your prognosis, or outlook for the future, will depend on:
- How well your heart muscle is working.
- Your symptoms.
- How well you respond to your treatment plan.
- How well you follow your treatment plan.
One study says that people with heart failure have a life span 10 years shorter than those who dont have heart failure. Another study showed that the survival rates of people with chronic heart failure were 80% to 90% for one year, but that dropped to 50% to 60% for year five and down to 30% for 10 years.
A different study found that people who had heart failure and were discharged from the hospital had expected life spans ranging from three to 20 years, depending on various factors like age and gender. Its important to look at your specific situation when considering your prognosis.
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Drinking This Just Once Increases Your Heart Disease Risk Warns Mayo Clinic
Medical experts say it’s unsafe to have even one can of this popular drink.
You already know that what you put in your body matters, and that less healthy foods and drinks should be consumed in moderation. However, Mayo Clinic experts warn that there’s one popular beverage that could put you at serious health riskeven in the smallest amounts. In fact, even a single serving may put you at an elevated risk of heart disease. Read on to find out which type of drink is setting off alarm bells for medical professionals.
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Setting Up The Cardio
Mayo Clinic has established a Cardio-oncology Clinic to improve the overall acute and long-term outcome of cancer patients. This subspecialty was initially created: 1) to facilitate the diagnosis, monitoring and therapy of cancer treatment related cardiovascular complications 2) to evaluate baseline cardiovascular risks prior to cancer treatment and implement strategies for risk reduction of developing cardiovascular complications and 3) to assist the patient with cardiovascular care through long-term follow up. The multidisciplinary team consists of cardiologists with additional expertise in prevention, heart failure, vascular disease, and cardiovascular imaging. It also encompasses oncologists, hematologists, internists, nurses, pharmacists, and all others involved in the care of cancer patients. As previously mentioned, the interdisciplinary communication and coordination is crucial to the operational functionality of the cardio-oncology practice.
Table 1 Setting up a cardio-oncology clinicFig. 2
Cardio-Oncology Visits and Referral Source. a and b Bar charts showing the average monthly visits in 2014 and 2015. c Cardio-Oncology Referral Source. Pie chart displaying the proportion of type of cancers referred to the Cardio-Oncology Clinic
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Mayo Clinic Trial Signals Potential For Ai
The Mayo Clinic released results of a trial this week that suggests potential for artificial intelligence to assist with early diagnosis of some types of heart disease.
The study, published inNature Medicine on Thursday, found that an AI-enabled electrocardiogram increased the diagnosis of low ejection fraction.
“The AI-enabled EKG facilitated the diagnosis of patients with low ejection fraction in a real-world setting by identifying people who previously would have slipped through the cracks,” said Dr. Peter Noseworthy, a Mayo Clinic cardiac electrophysiologist who was the senior author on the study, in a press release.
WHY IT MATTERS
Ejection fraction is a measurement of how much blood the left ventricle pumps out with each contraction. A lower-than-normal ejection fraction can be a sign of heart failure.
Diagnosing low ejection fraction early can be key to effective treatment. And as the Mayo Clinic notes, an echocardiogram can do so, but it is time-consuming and resource-heavy. By contrast, an EKG is readily available, inexpensive and fast.
The ECG AI-Guided Screening for Low Ejection Fraction, or EAGLE, was aimed at determining whether an AI-enabled EKG algorithm trial could help improve the diagnosis of this condition.
Over eight months, 22,641 adult patients received an EKG under the medical supervision of 348 primary care clinicians throughout Minnesota.
The low ejection fraction algorithm has received Food and Drug Administration breakthrough designation.
Early Attention To Heart Disease
Congestive heart failure is one of the leading causes of death in the elderly and is not curable. The best course is to avoid or treat early known causes of the disease to prevent or limit damage to the heart. See your doctor if you notice early signs that might indicate CHF such as shortness of breath or fluid in your legs.
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Heart Failure Treatment Is A Team Effort
Heart failure management is a team effort, and you are the key player on the team. Your heart doctor will prescribe your medications and manage other medical problems. Other team members — including nurses, dietitians, pharmacists, exercise specialists, and social workers — will help you achieve success. But it is up to YOU to take your medications, make dietary changes, live a healthy lifestyle, keep your follow-up appointments, and be an active member of the team.
If you notice anything unusual, don’t wait until your next appointment to discuss it with your doctor. Call them right away if you have:
- Unexplained weight gain
- Swelling in your ankles, feet, legs, or belly that gets worse
- Shortness of breath that gets worse or happens more often, especially if you wake up feeling that way
- Bloating with a loss of appetite or nausea
- Extreme fatigue or more trouble finishing your daily activities
- A lung infection or a cough that gets worse
- Fast heart rate
- New irregular heartbeat
Stages Of Heart Failure
In 2001, the American Heart Association and American College of Cardiology described the “Stages of Heart Failure.” These stages, which were updated in 2005, will help you understand that heart failure is often a progressive condition and can worsen over time. They will also help you understand why a new medication was added to your treatment plan and may help you understand why lifestyle changes and other treatments are needed.
The stages classified by the AHA and ACC are different than the New York Heart Association clinical classifications of heart failure that rank patients as class I-II-III-IV, according to the degree of symptoms or functional limits. Ask your doctor what stage of heart failure you are in.
Check the table below to see if your therapy matches what the AHA and ACC recommend. Note that you cannot go backward in stage, only forward.
The table below outlines a basic plan of care that may or may not apply to you, based on the cause of your heart failure and your special needs. Ask your doctor to explain therapies that are listed if you do not understand why you are or are not receiving them.
The New York Heart Association clinical classifications of heart failure rank people as class I-II-III-IV, according to the degree of symptoms or functional limits. You can ask your doctor if you want to know what stage of heart failure youâre in.
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Is There A Treatment For Heart Failure
There are more treatment options available for heart failure than ever before. Tight control over your medications and lifestyle, coupled with careful monitoring, are the first steps. As the condition progresses, doctors specializing in the treatment of heart failure can offer more advanced treatment options.
The goals of treating heart failure are to try to keep it from getting worse , to ease symptoms, and to improve quality of life.
Some common types of medicines used to treat it are:
- ACE inhibitors
- Aldosterone antagonists
- Selective sinus node inhibitors
- Soluble guanylate cyclase stimulator
Your doctor may also recommend a program called cardiac rehabilitation to help you exercise safely and keep up a heart-healthy lifestyle. It usually includes workouts that are designed just for you, education, and tips to lower your chance of heart trouble, like quitting smoking or changing your diet.
Cardiac rehab also offers emotional support. You can meet people like you who can help you stay on track.