You can help prevent congestive heart failure by following a low-salt, low-fat diet.
People who have congestive heart failure should avoid processed foods and high-sodium foods such as chips, chocolate, bacon, ham, and canned soups and vegetables.
While no one should consume large amounts of alcohol, people taking diuretics or with fluid retention problems may need to restrict any type of fluid intake.
It’s also important to monitor your weight gain by weighing yourself at least every other day. Substantial weight gain may mean you are retaining too much fluid and should be reported to your health professional.
Follow your health professional’s recommendations for rest and exercise, and try to lower known stresses in your life. Learn to take your blood pressure or have it checked at your medical centre regularly.
What Causes Congestive Heart Failure?
Congestive heart failure can be caused by a number of conditions that damage the heart muscle, including a heart attack or heart infection; coronary artery disease; excessive alcohol consumption; an over- or under-active thyroid gland; and untreated high blood pressure.
Congestive heart failure can also be caused by damage to or abnormalities in the valves inside the heart, which regulate blood flow out of the heart, and genetic conditions, such as hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, in which the heart muscle becomes thickened due to enlarged heart muscle cells.
Factors such as high fever, anemia, lung infections, pulmonary embolism, high salt or fluid intake, overexertion, obesity, stress, and rapid heartbeat can worsen or trigger congestive heart failure in people with already weakened hearts.
Then you need to read this book, by New Zealand author, Dr. David Lovell-Smith.
In this book Dr. David Lovell-Smith describes how his patients successfully used diet, lifestyle changes and Transcendental Meditation to bring their blood pressure down.
This book offers new hope and insight for those with high blood pressure but it is not for hypertensives alone. The knowledge which Dr Lovell-Smith presents in his book is timely and relevant, and its exposition is long overdue.
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