Coronary Artery Disease – Linked to CHF

Transcript

It’s important to know that coronary artery disease (or CAD) and congestive heart failure (CHF) are two different conditions but are very much linked. CAD is one of the biggest risk factors for CHF and a lot of tests that we do are similar in both. For example, an EKG can help to diagnose CAD as well as CHF and look different in both conditions. Coronary artery disease can cause heart attacks and can also cause heart failure, as decreased perfusion to the heart can then lead to what’s called infarcts in the heart and therefore decreased wall motion. This in turn can cause heart failure as a weaker heart can then no longer pump blood to the body as sufficiently as it should. Some of the tests that we do (like I mentioned, EKGs as well as Echos) can detect differences in CAD versus CHF.