Posted By Jenis Shah

Why monitor weight and water intake in heart failure patients

Patients with heart failure have weak heart. A weak /failing heart is unable to pump enough blood. If there is more water in the body and heart is not able to pump then that extra water will accumulate in the body resulting in weight gain, will go the lungs leading to shortness of breath, will go the legs resulting in swelling over feet or in the abdomen resulting in abdominal swelling, nausea, vomiting, decreased appetite. So this is why we need to keep only enough water in the body which your weak heart is able to pump.

On the other side if amount of water is less than required then your kidney function may compromise. 

So this is why patients with heart failure are advised to maintain their dry weight and for that a restricted fluid intake is advised which varies from patient to patient. 

Weight monitoring gives a fairly good idea how my patient is doing. A patient who is maintaining his weight with less than 1 kg variation is dong good. Patients who is gaining weight is accumulating water in body and is going towards heart failure while patients who is loosing weight beyond advised limit may be heading towards kidney failure. Either of these are not desired.

So if you are gaining weight daily then first thing you are supposed to do is to reduce your liquid intake (water/tea/coffee/milk etc). Despite fluid restriction if you are still gaining weight then consult your doctor without delay. Similarly if your weight is progressively decreasing beyond the advised limit then you may increase your liquid intake.

These are very simple things to monitor at home and need simple steps to correct them. And these simple steps can avoid hospital visit and hospitalization.