Heart failure is a condition in which the heart has lost the ability to pump enough blood to the body’s tissues. With too little blood being delivered, the organs and other tissues do not receive enough oxygen and nutrients to function properly.
Obesity is known to increase the risk of heart failure, but new results indicate that physical activity can reduce the risk. Atrial fibrillation is an irregular and often rapid heart rate that can increase the risk of stroke, heart failure and other heart-related complications. It’s more common in older people, and as it happens, in … Read more
Visits to emergency departments for patients with hypertension increased by 64 percent between 2002 and 2012 while hospitalizations for those visits declined by 28 percent. A study published in Annals of Emergency Medicine suggests that aggressive home monitoring of blood pressure may be driving patients to emergency departments despite the lack of other emergency conditions, … Read more
Heart failure is a common endpoint for many cardiovascular diseases. This syndrome is characterized by reduced cardiac output that leads to dyspnea, exercise intolerance and later death. More than 20 million people worldwide are estimated to have heart failure. And, this situation will get worse since the prevalence of heart failure will rise as the … Read more
Scientists found that a daily dose of beetroot juice significantly improved exercise endurance and blood pressure in elderly patients with heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFPEF). Exercise intolerance – shortness of breath and fatigue with normal amounts of exertion — is the primary symptom of HFPEF and is due partly to non-cardiac factors that … Read more
COPD patients at significantly higher risk of heart failure – Patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) have a complication to worry about is heart failure. A new study found the prevalence of heart failure is significantly higher in patients with COPD compared to the rest of the study population. They also found that the risk was especially high among African-American patients with COPD.
Duration of diabetes and advancing age independently predict diabetes complications, risk of death – The duration of diabetes and advancing age independently predict diabetes severity and risk of death in older adults with type 2 diabetes. In a new study led by Kaiser Permanente and the University of Chicago, researchers investigated contemporary rates of diabetes complications and risk of death then contrasted them across categories of age and duration of diabetes.
Disrupting an antioxidant pathway prevents heart disease caused by reductive stress – Researchers have found that deficiency of an antioxidant response protein called nuclear erythroid-2 like factor-2 (Nrf2) delays or prevents hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, a type of a heart failure in which the heart muscle grows abnormally thick.
UCLA researchers find nanodiamonds could improve effectiveness of breast cancer treatment – Recently, doctors have begun to categorize breast cancers into four main groups according to the genetic makeup of the cancer cells. Which category a cancer falls into generally determines the best method of treatment.
Cleveland Clinic research shows anemia drug does not improve health of anemic heart failure patients — Phase 3 findings published in NEJM provide answers about treatment with darbepoetin alfa – Researchers from Cleveland Clinic and Sweden-based Sahlgrenska University Hospital have found that a commonly used drug to treat anemia in heart failure patients – darbepoetin alfa – does not improve patients’ health, nor does it reduce their risk of death from heart failure.
Pacemaker could help more heart failure patients – A new study from Karolinska Institutet demonstrates that a change in the ECG wave called the QRS prolongation is associated with a higher rate of heart-failure mortality. According to the team that carried out the study suggests that more heart failure cases could be helped by pacemakers.
