PROLOGUE The following paper presents the pathophysiology lecture content for congestive heart failure at the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy & Health Sciences. At the College, pathophysiology is a three credit course required for students in the PharmD, PA and BS in Pharmaceutical Sciences programs. The goal of this course is to give students a detailed understanding of the mechanisms involv...

Background Sympathetic hyperactivity and parasympathetic withdrawal in patients with congestive heart failure correlate closely with disease severity and overall survival. The modulating effects of drugs on the autonomic dysfunction may contribute to improve survival. Low-dose scopolamine has a vagomimetic effect in normal subjects and patients after acute myocardial infarction. We assessed whe...

background: many factors influence the prognosis of patients with (chf), among these; more attention has been focused on the role of left bundle branch block (lbbb).  the present study was performed to find out the prevalence of chf in lbbb patients. methods: in this cross-sectional study, 246 were diagnosed consecutive patients with lbbb pattern in ecg during july 2004 until october 2006 at im...

Congestive heart failure, in particular with preserved left ventricular ejection fraction, is increasing in incidence. Hypertensive disease is also increasing, and data suggest that this is a major contributor to the increasing incidence of congestive heart failure. In addition, there are data suggesting that patients with hypertension not only have a high prevalence of impaired left ventricula...

We have studied a case of intractable congestive heart failure who died and her autopsy revealed a peri­cardial mesothelioma and left atrial myxoma.The mesothe­lioma was huge;much larger than the heart.  Histological examination of the mesothelioma showed a mixed fibre-epithelial patern,with areas of myxoid chan­ges. Since it is a rare tumor we have reviewed the liter­ature on the pericardial ...

Congestive heart failure is a leading cause of cardiovascular mortality in the United States and Europe.1 Clinically, this syndrome is characterized by water retention and often left ventricular dilatation with poor systolic contractility. Etiologically, congestive heart failure can be of genetic or acquired origin. In 1993, 2 groups independently reported mutations in the cytoskeletal protein ...

concomitant coronary artery bypass surgery (cabg) in patients undergoing mitral valve replacement (mvr) has been shown to be an important risk factor for hospital mortality. we evaluated preoperative characteristics, postoperative complications, in-hospital mortality rate, and length of stay in hospital for patients undergoing concurrent cabg with mvr. preoperative and postoperative clinical da...

PLASMA NOREPINEPHRINE CONCENTRATIONS, which increase in patients with congestive heart failure, reflect the severity of the disease and are closely related to prognosis.1 Because sympathetic activity is enhanced with increasing severity of congestive heart failure, the severity and prognosis of congestive heart failure can be evaluated based on parameters determined by I-123 metaiodobenzylguani...

INTRODUCTION The diagnosis and management of congestive heart failure at the primary care level is difficult. Despite advances in medical therapy, namely angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors and beta-blockers, congestive heart failure remains a common cause of hospital visits. The extent to which these advances have been implemented in primary care is uncertain. We therefore sought to asses...

The use of antihypertensive agents has increased in recent years and has been more marked among individuals in older age groups (65-74 years) than in middle-aged groups (45-54 years). Because hypertension is a strong risk factor for the development of congestive heart failure, more common use of antihypertensive agents would be expected to reduce the incidence of congestive heart failure. Exami...