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Bronchodilators are a top-line treatment for heart failure. Just kidding! However, some studies do show that some bronchospasm may result from heart failure. But, this bronchospasm is secondary to fluid overload. A bronchodilator will not treat heart failure. It may relieve some of the shortness of breath if it is caused by bronchospasm. So, you can only treat heart failure with heart failure medicine. Here's what the Mayo Clinic says: " You can't reverse many conditions that lead to heart failure, but heart failure can often be treated with good results. Medications can improve the signs and symptoms of heart failure." Treatment for heart failure includes. Medicine . Medicines used to treat heart failure are those that strengthen the strength and contractility of the heart, such as Digoxin. They also include medicines to lower the blood pressure or to make patients pee, such as Lasix or Bumex. These are medicines that are often taken every day to prevent heart failur...

Heart failure is when the heart is too weak to pump blood through the body. It poops out. The patient becomes winded on exertion as the person's heart cannot keep up with demands on the body. So, what causes heart failure? Here's what to know. 1.  Hypertension : Coronary artery disease is one ailment that causes blood vessels to become narrow. Years of working hard to pump blood through narrowed vessels can cause the heart to become hypertrophied (enlarged). A large bicep is good, and it's a sign of good health. A large heart is a sign of a weak pump. It is bad. Eventually, it will tire and become an ineffective pump. In fact, 60% of heart failure cases are the result of high systemic blood pressure and coronary artery disease. 2.  Coronary Artery Disease (CAD) : According to the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute ( NHLBI ) ,  CAD is a disease whereby plaque builds up inside the coronary arteries (arteries that supply oxygenated blood to the heart)....

It's asthma even if it's heart failure. So, it was so long ago. It was in 1998. I was called to a room. The patient was extremely short of breath. The patient was winded. She was sitting in the recliner all frogged up. She was blue. Her saturation was 77%. The nurse said, "She just went to the commode and she got like this."  I was a new RT. I was stressed. What do I do? Thankfully, a senior RT came to the rescue. She smoothly investigated the situation. She said, "What are the patients i's and o's." It was the first time I heard that question asked. The  nurse said, "I don't know?" The RT bluntly said, "I think we should check." Later she said to me, "Sadly, RTs are the only people who ever check the i's and o's." Twenty years later, when I found myself the seasoned RT, I found myself saying the same thing to a new RT. Go figure! Twenty years on this job and not much has changed. So, anyway, this seasoned RT...

So often respiratory therapists are required to give breathing treatments to patients presenting with dyspnea and wheezing. This is fine and dandy if it's asthma. But, when it's heart failure (a.ka. cardiac asthma), a bronchodilator isn't going to work. The treatment is something else, totally. But, because we are good RTs, we do the treatment anyway. And, while the treatment is going, we investigate the patient's chart. We often begin and end with the i's and o's (ins and outs). It ends if we determine the patients I's are way more than the O's. This means the patient is probably wet. And it means that it's probably not bronchospasm and shouldn't be treated as such. As we just proved once again, among the most common reasons for this failure is a misdiagnosis of asthma when the primary cause of symptoms is actually heart failure. So, that said, the RT Cave participated in an unofficial poll of 2,000 respiratory therapists. Nearly 80% of them sai...