Why Do Hearts Fail?
Your heart is an amazing organ. It is a small group of muscles that work together to create circulation. The heart is one of the earliest organs to form in a fetus. Once it starts beating, it will continue to beat for many decades. The smooth muscle cells of the heart can repair themselves when they are injured. One thing the heart can’t do is make more heart muscle cells. If a heart muscle cell dies, it turns into scar tissue and the heart beats on with one less cell. One day, it may be possible to inject stem cells into an injured heart and encourage the stem cells to become new heart cells. But, for now, it’s important for you to minimize the loss of your heart cells to keep your heart healthy.
Heart injury isn’t just something that happens to the elderly. Some heart injuries are sudden like a heart attack. Other injuries are slower like alcohol use, smoking, poorly-controlled diabetes and uncontrolled high blood pressure. Injured heart muscle cells give doctors warning signs. The amount of blood circulated by the heart decreases. The heart enlarges. Chemical biomarkers leak out from injured cells into your blood. These are all signs that the heart muscle cells are failing to do their primary job of maintaining your circulation. Heart cells have an expected lifespan. As we age, the cumulative injuries to heart cells result in more frequent cell death. Heart failure becomes more common as we age.
In medicine, we have very effective treatments for heart failure. Lifestyle changes and medication are the most common treatments. In severe cases, we have battery-powered devices that assist the heart in pumping (LVAD). Heart transplants are done almost exclusively for patients who have severe heart failure. Early intervention, especially in cases where lifestyle treatments are needed, can slow the process of heart injury and prolong the patient’s life.
Early diagnosis of heart failure would be a significant advance in medicine. It would allow the provider to begin treatment earlier and preserve heart cells. Since the patient cannot make new heart cells, preserving the function of the patient’s heart cells becomes a medical priority. In my experience, when a patient has an abnormal heart test, this has been the most effective motivation for that patient finally making important lifestyle changes like stopping bad habits or controlling underlying diseases. Our company is working on an innovative medical device that may allow earlier diagnosis of heart failure. As our research and development contiues, we will keep the public informed about our progress.
