Acute heart failure: classification, diagnosis, general approaches to treatment

Abstract

Acute heart failure (HF) is a syndrome requiring urgent treatment. Due to drastic increase in the number of HF patients this problem is still of great importance for modern public health care and has a significant impact on morbidity and mortality. This article presents modern approaches to the classification of this condition, describes diagnostic algorithms, and discovers general methods of acute HF therapy. Two clinical axes are described the presence of stasis in one or two circuits of blood circulation and peripheral hypoperfusion, on the basis of which the individual approaches to treatment strategy of patients with this symptom complex are developed.

Keywords

• acute heart failure
• clinical severity classification
• hypoperfusion
• natriuretic peptides