PAUL J. MONIZ, MD: Next to him, we have Dr. Ainat
Benjaminovitz, who is a cardiologist at the same hospital, and who has
agreed to be called Dr. B for the rest of the segment for my purposes.
We appreciate that.
Dr. Maybaum, let's begin with you. Can you give
us a more detailed description of what congestive heart failure is, and
does it refer to all heart failures?
SIMON MAYBAUM, MD: Well, I certainly would agree
that heart failure and congestive heart failure is a very serious problem.
Certainly, we're becoming now more aware of how serious it is in our community.
Heart failure is essentially a disease of the heart muscle
or the valves of the heart which make it weak or fail, as its name suggests.
So, the heart cannot continue to form its normal function. As we
know, the heart pumps blood through the body and then returns it through
the lungs. When the heart fails and the muscle becomes weak, or the
valves become ineffectual, the heart enlarges. Blood accumulates
in the heart, and then eventually in other parts of the body.
Heart failure can start from an unnoticeable condition,
that which we call asymptomatic, and progress to a severely debilitating
disease; one which mimics, in some ways, cancer where the patients are
really bed bound and have very little hope for the future. So, it's
a very wide range of presentations.
