Pharmacotherapy of congestive heart failure in the elderly

Abstract

This thesis was carried out in order to determine the modern line of treatment of congestive heart failure (CHF) and to identify specific problems associated with drug treatment for CHF in the elderly. A survey was carried out at St. Luke’s Hospital and Ħas-Serħ Hospital. The treatment chart of 118 patients over sixty years currently in CHF was investigated. From the survey it resulted that diuretics are still the first line of treatment for CHF, whereas digoxin remains the drug of choice in CHF when there is supraventricular tachycardia. The incidence of CHF in the elderly increases with age. In fact, eighty per cent of patients with CHF are older than sixty years of age, the greatest prevalence in both males and females occurring in the seventh decade of life. Within this age group, CHF may result from several factors such as coronary artery disease, hypertension, valvular disease or intrinsic myocardiopathies. Heart failure in the elderly is not fundamentally different from heart failure in any other age. However, it is more common and almost certainly more often misdiagnosed or missed.