Cardiomyopathy
 See all Pictures & Images
Cardiomyopathy Treatment
While all types of cardiomyopathy can cause heart failure, each case requires specific strategies for recovery. Heart failure is treated with a vigorous blend of patient education, dietary changes, and medications.
Possible medications include:
-
Positive inotropic agents: These chemicals help the heart contract. The main agent of this category is digoxin. In-hospital options include dopamine, dobutamine, and milrinone.
-
Diuretics: Often called "water pills," diuretics help relieve the fluid overloads in heart failure.
-
Vasodilators: These drugs dilate blood vessels at several levels in the body, reducing the workload for the heart.
-
ACE-inhibitors and Beta blockers: These treatments act as vasodilators while helping to preserve the normal architecture of the heart muscle
-
Other drugs: Angiotensin II receptor blockers, antiarrhythmic drugs, and blood thinners.
Another technique which can be used is biventricular pacing. In this treatment, a pacemaker lead (i.e., cable) is inserted in each ventricle to help the heart contract better.
In severe cases, surgical procedures, which can be implemented to sustain life until a transplant donor becomes available, can help but do not cure the disease. They include:
-
Left Ventricular Assist Device (LVAD): Treatment provides mechanical circulatory support.
-
Dynamic Cardiomyoplasty: A procedure in which a skeletal muscle flap, created from a patient's thoracic muscle, is trained to contract often and "wrapped around" the heart to help it contract.
Advanced, severe heart failure requires heart transplantation.
|
