Heart failure
Heart failure is a condition where the heart cannot pump blood efficiently through the body. Heart failure should not be confused with cardiac arrest (when the heart suddenly stops beating and there is no circulation of blood) or heart attack / myocardial infarction (interruption of blood supply to the heart muscle).
Heart failure is a progressive condition where the pumping power of the heart decreases over time.
Heart failure is caused by many conditions including a heart attack, coronary artery disease (obstruction in the arteries supplying the heart muscle leading to reduced blood flow to the heart), cardiomyopathy (damage to the heart muscle), hypertension, valve disease, kidney disease or heart defects present at birth. Treating these causes during early stages can prevent or delay the development of heart failure.
The signs and symptoms of heart failure vary depending on the severity of the condition. The symptoms could be constant or could come and go and are related to the changes in the heart and body. Symptoms could include -
- Shortness of breath
- Fluid retention or swelling in the feet, ankles, legs or abdomen
- Fatigue
- Rapid or irregular heartbeats
Heart failure is diagnosed based upon your medical examination and certain investigations.
Treatment includes treating the underlying cause of your heart failure, medicines, and heart transplantation if other treatments fail.
Back to top
Our products
Our prescription medicines range across therapeutic areas such as anti-infectives, dermatology, gynaecology, diabetes, cardiovascular disease and respiratory diseases.
This section may contains information in several formats:
To download PDF files you will need Adobe Reader. If you do not have it installed, it is available free from the Adobe website. PDF links on this site open in a new window.
For audio-visual content you can use either Windows Media Player or Real Player, which can be installed free from their respective websites.