MADRID, 30 (EUROPA PRESS)
Early diagnosis and adherence to treatment are key in the approach to heart failure (HF) since, if it is not treated in time and adequately, 50 of the patients die within five years, according to what has been pointed out. the president of the Heart Failure Association of the Spanish Society of Cardiology (SEC) and cardiologist at the Virgen Rocío Hospital in Seville, Dr. Alejandro Recio, pointing out that, today, “new treatments can improve the prognosis, as long as when you act in time and consult quickly”.
This was explained during the Breakfast ‘Analyzing the impact of heart failure’, organized by the SEC this Tuesday to address the impact of this disease and the need to pay attention to the symptoms to prevent its evolution.
“HF is a problem where the heart cannot release enough blood to carry nutrients to the rest of the body. The patient suffocates, finds it difficult to lead a normal life, begins to retain fluids, etc. It is considered a true epidemic, it is the first cause of admission in patients over 65 years of age and has a very high mortality rate,” detailed Dr. Recio.
Currently in the world there are 26 million people affected by heart failure, and 770,000 affected in Spain, which represents 5-7 percent of those over 45 years of age, although it is a disease closely associated with aging so the majority of Those affected are over 65 years old. In addition, it greatly affects mortality since one in ten people will die before being discharged, 20 percent die in the first year and 50 percent die after five years if they have not received adequate treatment.
For her part, the vice president of the Spanish Nursing Association of Malaga, Conchi Cruzado, explained that the symptoms of heart failure include “tiredness, a feeling that your arms and legs are heavy, a feeling of lack of air, which is difficult climbing stairs, tying shoes, etc., feeling of shortness of breath when lying in bed, fluid retention in the legs or stomach, etc.
The causes of heart failure are “fundamentally two: high blood pressure and coronary problems”, although lifestyle habits such as alcohol also influence since, “taking not very high quantities for a long time can cause a person prone to HF cases,” explained the head of the heart failure section at the Reina Sofía Hospital in Córdoba, Manuel Anguita. “High blood pressure explains 70-75 percent of heart failure cases,” he added.
Likewise, experts have highlighted that, although the symptoms are very similar in men and women, it is a more common disease in women and the prognosis is “a little worse”, in addition to the deterioration in the quality of life is “much longer in women than in men,” which is why it is also “key to anticipate the deterioration being irreversible.”
On the other hand, one of the causes of suffering from heart failure is cancer treatments such as chemotherapy since these are “cardiotoxic” and can damage the heart. “A woman with breast cancer is more likely to die from heart failure than from cancer,” stressed Dr. Alejandro Recio, emphasizing the need to pay more attention to this disease, just as is done with others such as cancer.
This is the case of Soledad Galán, an IC patient who told her testimony during the meeting highlighting the great impact that this disease has on her quality of life, especially due to the fatigue it produces. “My heart failure was caused by chemotherapy and the treatments damaged the heart. Sometimes patients are indolent, in HF the lack of knowledge makes you not take it so seriously, you have to take control of the disease and take the medication” Galan has declared.
NEW TREATMENTS AND IC UNITS: KEYS IN THE APPROACH
The lack of knowledge about heart failure and its impact on quality of life means that, in many cases, specialists are late in diagnosing it and patients are not adherent to treatment because they do not consider it “so relevant.” “Health personnel themselves sometimes do not give enough importance to the symptoms of HF,” said Dr. Aejandro Recio.
In this context, Dr. Recio has highlighted that “the creation of heart failure units and new treatments have totally changed the paradigm and the way of seeing the disease and treating patients” since, “it instructs patients the severity of the disease” and this causes “the lack of adherence to drop greatly because you make them see the disease, just like in cancer, that patients take the treatment because they know the severity.”
“In a matter of 2-3 months, patients can recover heart contraction. With the different treatments available we can block five pathways and the disease can be controlled,” he declared.
AWARENESS CAMPAIGN ‘DON’T LET IT GO OFF’
In this context and with the aim of promoting the message that an early diagnosis is an early treatment, the Spanish Society of Cardiology has created the campaign ‘Don’t let it turn off’, with the background of “not letting the heart turn off.” “treating IC on time and treating it appropriately.
This is an audiovisual campaign through which the Society will disseminate explanatory videos about the disease and with the testimonies of different patients.
