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Heart failure - chronic - Background information
Right heart failure and left heart failure
- Right heart failure versus left heart failure
- The terms 'right heart failure' and 'left heart failure' are used to contrast situations where the predominant symptoms and signs reflect congestion of the systemic (right) or pulmonary (left) veins. With right heart failure, there is dependent oedema, the liver is engorged, and the jugular veins are distended. With left heart failure, there are features of pulmonary oedema with symptoms of breathlessness and signs on chest X-ray of excess fluid in the lungs.
- The term 'right heart failure' seems to imply that the primary problem has to do with the right side of the heart, and 'left heart failure' seems to imply that the primary problem has to do with the left side of the heart. However, this is often not the case. For example the most common cause of right heart failure is failure of the left ventricle to pump sufficient blood through the kidneys — salt and water are retained, fluid accumulates in the systemic circulation, and the pulmonary artery pressure increases to the point where the right ventricle fails.
- Because the terms 'right heart failure' and 'left heart failure' can be misleading, they are not further used in this CKS topic.
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