Discuss the condition known as heart failure, including incidence, prevalence and mortality rates.

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Heart failure is not complete failure of the heart but is said to occur when the heart muscle becomes ineffective at pumping enough blood and oxygen to meet the needs of the lungs and other body parts. It is most often due to damage of the left ventricle but may also occur as right-sided failure when there is lung disease or pulmonary artery disease. Failure may be acute such as happens when a portion of the muscle dies during a myocardial infarction, but it is more commonly a chronic disorder. Other medical conditions strongly associated with heart failure include coronary artery disease, hypertension, and diabetes, as well as others. The incidence of heart failure is about 10 in 1,000 population after the age of 65 years old. This markedly increases with increased age. The rates in white women are about one-half of those in white men, but the rates in black women are only slightly less than those in black men. Over all, blacks had the highest risk of developing heart failure (4.6 per 1,000 person-years), followed by Hispanics (3.5 per 1,000 person-years), whites (2.4 per 1,000 person-years), and Asian Americans (1.0 per 1,000 person-years). The higher rates among certain ethnicities are reflective of differences in the prevalence of hypertension and diabetes, as well as socioeconomic status. The overall mortality rate is 85.4 per 100,000 population, or 1 in 9 deaths are related to heart failure. The gender and ethnicity differences for mortality are the same as those reported in relation to incidence.