Your doctor might suggest a combination of lifestyle changes, medication, and sometimes surgery to try and treat heart failure.
Lifestyle changes include:
- A healthy diet (you should limit salt intake to help reduce swelling)
- Maintain a balanced and healthy diet
- Quit smoking
- Reduce or eliminate consumption of alcohol and other harmful drugs
- Exercise regularly (your doctor can recommend a specific type of fitness regime)
Medications include:
- To aid Arrhythmia
- To help get rid of excess fluid in the tissues (diuretics)
- Help to stimulate heart's pump action (Diagoxin)
- To lower blood pressure (vasodilators, ace inhibitors, arbs, and calcium channel blockers)
- Your doctor might recommend surgery to correct heart abnormalities that causes heart failure.
For end-stage heart failure, your doctor may suggest:
- Heart Transplantation
- Left Ventricular Assist Device (LVAD) - A mechanical heart to aid in the heart's pumping function to transport oxygen-rich blood into the body. This device is placed into the patient's chest but does not replace the heart. This procedure is most used in terminally ill patients.
- Mechanical Heart Device - more commonly known as an artificial heart, this is a man-made pump which takes over the pumping action of the heart.