Heart Failure
This type of heart failure involves impaired contraction and reduced ejection fraction.
What is systolic heart failure (HFrEF)?
This vital sign is the primary measurement used to diagnose hypertension.
What is blood pressure?
This condition often begins silently as fatty streaks in the coronary vessels and progresses to plaque buildup that can limit myocardial oxygen supply, especially during exertion.
What is coronary artery disease?
This condition causes leg pain during walking that goes away with rest.
What is intermittent claudication?
This first‑line antihypertensive medication class reduces blood pressure by decreasing intravascular volume and sodium reabsorption, but may cause hyponatremia or hypokalemia.
What are thiazide diuretics?
A patient with worsening heart failure reports a 3‑lb weight gain overnight and increasing dyspnea. This nursing action is the priority.
What is assess lung sounds for fluid overload?
This cardiovascular condition can be caused by long‑standing hypertension, increases the risk of arrhythmias and heart failure, and is characterized by thickening of the ventricular wall due to chronic pressure overload.
What is left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH)?
These fluffy, white retinal lesions—caused by microinfarctions of the nerve fiber layer—are commonly seen in hypertensive retinopathy and signal chronic damage to small vessels in the eye.
What are cotton‑wool spots?
These warning signs of reduced blood flow to the heart caused by narrowing of coronary arteries (atherosclerosis) may include chest discomfort with exertion, shortness of breath, fatigue, nausea, diaphoresis, and pain that may radiate to the jaw, neck, shoulder, or arm.
What are clinical signs of coronary artery disease?
This condition is diagnosed when the ankle–brachial index falls below 0.90 and is characterized by exertional leg pain relieved by rest.
What is peripheral arterial disease (PAD)?
This simple daily nursing intervention helps detect early fluid retention in heart failure and should be done at the same time each morning, using the same clothing and equipment.
What are daily weights?
Before administering this medication for heart failure, the nurse must check the apical pulse for one full minute and hold it for bradycardia.
What is digoxin?
These contributors to declining cardiac function include older age, cigarette smoking, obesity, poorly managed diabetes, metabolic syndrome, and chronic kidney disease.
What are risk factors for heart failure?
These contributors to elevated blood pressure include family history, aging, high sodium intake, obesity, physical inactivity, alcohol use, stress, and African American ethnicity.
What are risk factors for hypertension?
Episodic chest pain caused by transient coronary artery vasospasm, leading to temporary myocardial ischemia (not due to fixed atherosclerotic plaque). Characterized by transient ST-segment elevation.
What is Prinzmetal (variant) angina?
These two types of lower‑extremity ulcers can be distinguished by their borders: one is typically irregular and shallow due to venous hypertension and edema, while the other is round and “punched‑out” with well-defined borders because of ischemic tissue loss.
What are venous ulcers and arterial ulcers?
“Venous = messy and irregular; arterial = round and punched‑out.”
This dietary approach to help lower blood pressure emphasizes fruits, vegetables, whole grains, and low sodium (no more than 2gm per day).
What is the DASH diet?
A patient on digoxin has a potassium level of 2.9 and reports nausea and visual disturbances. The nurse recognizes the patient is at high risk for this complication.
What is digoxin toxicity?
A normal ejection fraction is typically greater than this percentage.
What is 50%?
This condition involves abrupt BP >180/120 mmHg without any signs of end‑organ damage.
What is hypertensive urgency?
Onset of this type of chest pain is new, occurs at rest or with minimal exertion, is not fully relieved by rest or nitroglycerin, and may last >20 minutes. It signals an unpredictable decrease in coronary blood flow that may precede a myocardial infarction. Troponins remain normal, and ECG shows changes (ST depression or T‑wave inversion).
What is unstable angina?
This condition involves protein‑rich swelling due to impaired lymphatic drainage.
What is lymphedema?
This essential nursing teaching point stresses taking antihypertensive medications consistently, even when the patient feels well.
What is medication adherence?
A patient with systolic heart failure starts a new medication and later develops a persistent dry cough. The nurse recognizes this as a common side effect of this drug class.
What is an ACE inhibitor?
Bonus: What medication class is the recommended alternative?
These findings may include dyspnea, orthopnea, crackles that don’t clear with coughing, rapid weight gain, dependent edema, fatigue, and jugular vein distention.
What are clinical signs of heart failure?
This life‑threatening condition, often linked to severe uncontrolled hypertension, presents with sudden tearing chest or back pain and results from a split in the layers of the aortic wall.
What is aortic dissection?
This medication, taken under the tongue, is used for quick relief of angina.
What is nitroglycerin?
This therapy is the cornerstone of venous insufficiency management.
What is compression therapy?
This medication class lowers LDL cholesterol and stabilizes plaque, reducing the risk of myocardial infarction in patients with coronary artery disease.
What are statins?
A patient with suspected myocardial ischemia receives this medication immediately to reduce platelet aggregation and improve outcomes.
What is low‑dose aspirin?
This diagnostic test is the gold standard for determining ejection fraction.
What is an echocardiogram?
This heart condition develops due to chronic pressure overload from hypertension.
What is left ventricular hypertrophy (LVH)?
This diagnostic test visualizes coronary artery stenosis directly.
What is cardiac catheterization (coronary angiography)?
This clinical finding—improved pain when the leg is dangled and worsened pain with elevation—helps distinguish severe arterial insufficiency from venous disease.
What is arterial rest pain?
This lifestyle intervention is one of the most effective ways to reduce progression of atherosclerosis and improve coronary perfusion.
What is smoking cessation?
A patient taking a statin reports new muscle pain and dark urine. This complication must be ruled out.
What is rhabdomyolysis?
These signs of inadequate circulation may include lightheadedness, confusion, cool pale extremities, muscle wasting, weakness, oliguria, and tachycardia at rest.
What are clinical manifestations of poor perfusion and low cardiac output?
Known as the “silent killer,” this condition causes progressive vascular injury leading to stroke, CKD, LVH, and retinopathy — often without any symptoms until organ damage occurs.
What is hypertension?
This vascular condition results from chronic endothelial injury and smooth muscle proliferation, becomes symptomatic when coronary narrowing reaches 75%, and is the root cause of most myocardial ischemia.
What is atherosclerosis?
This underlying condition leads to venous hypertension that causes brown hemosiderin staining, a thick leathery appearance of the lower legs, edema, and eventually shallow, irregularly bordered ulcers—most commonly around the medial malleolus.
What is venous insufficiency?
This medication relieves chest pain by dilating coronary arteries; patients should take it at the onset of discomfort and sit down to avoid hypotension. A headache is a common side effect that is expected and usually short-lived.
What is nitroglycerin?
This common side effect of nitroglycerin occurs due to cerebral vasodilation and should be explained to patients as expected.
What is a headache?
This condition occurs when pulmonary venous pressure forces fluid into alveoli.
What is pulmonary edema?
This severe, life‑threatening condition occurs when extremely high blood pressure causes acute damage to organs such as the brain, heart, kidneys, or eyes, requiring immediate blood‑pressure reduction.
What is hypertensive emergency?
This type of chest discomfort is predictable, occurs with exertion or emotional stress, and is relieved by rest or nitroglycerin because the underlying coronary narrowing is fixed.
What is stable angina?
This procedure is used to restore perfusion in severe PAD or critical limb ischemia.
What is revascularization (angioplasty, stent, or bypass)?
This nursing intervention improves perfusion in patients with peripheral arterial disease by using gravity to enhance blood flow to the legs.
What is dependent positioning?
Nitroglycerin must never be given if the patient has taken this class of medications within the past 24–48 hours.
What are phosphodiesterase‑5 inhibitors (e.g., sildenafil)?
These medications are commonly prescribed to improve symptoms, reduce workload on the heart, and slow the progression of heart failure.
What are ACE inhibitors, beta‑blockers, diuretics, vasodilators, and sometimes digoxin?
These four major organ systems are the most vulnerable to long‑term damage from uncontrolled hypertension, leading to complications such as stroke, TIA, vascular dementia, retinopathy, nephropathy, CAD, MI, left ventricular hypertrophy, atherosclerosis and heart failure.
What are brain, eyes, kidneys and heart?
These warning signs of worsening coronary ischemia may include chest pain at rest or with minimal exertion, increasing frequency or severity of discomfort (may last >20 minutes), shortness of breath, nausea, diaphoresis, and pain that may radiate to the jaw, neck, shoulder, or arm. Troponins are normal, and ECG shows ST-segment depression and T-wave inversion.
What are signs and symptoms of unstable angina?
This noninvasive test compares ankle and arm systolic pressures to diagnose peripheral arterial disease.
What is the ankle–brachial index (ABI)?
An ABI <0.90 confirms peripheral arterial disease.
This cornerstone treatment reduces the risk of thrombus formation on atherosclerotic plaque and is recommended for most patients with stable or unstable coronary artery disease.
What is antiplatelet therapy (e.g., aspirin)?
This intervention is essential for healing venous ulcers and works by improving venous return and reducing edema.
What is compression therapy?
This type of heart failure occurs when the ventricle becomes stiff and resists filling, leading to preserved ejection fraction but reduced cardiac output.
What is diastolic heart failure (HFpEF)?
These medications are commonly used to lower blood pressure and reduce the risk of end‑organ damage.
What are thiazide diuretics, ACE inhibitors, ARBs, calcium channel blockers, and sometimes beta‑blockers?
Although once taught as a standard early chest‑pain bundle, this combination of interventions is now used more selectively, with oxygen reserved for hypoxia, nitroglycerin avoided in right‑sided MI or hypotension, and morphine used cautiously due to potential adverse outcomes.
What is morphine, oxygen, nitroglycerin and low‑dose aspirin (MONA)?
This condition is characterized by episodic vasospasm of the small arteries—often triggered by cold or stress—leading to color changes in the fingers and toes that classically progress from white to blue to red.
What is Raynaud’s phenomenon?
Bonus: How is Primary Raynaud's differentiated from Secondary Raynaud's?
This intervention improves venous return and reduces edema in chronic venous insufficiency but is not appropriate for arterial disease.
What is elevating the legs?
Across heart failure, hypertension, CAD, angina, and vascular disorders, this nursing priority guides safe medication administration by identifying hypotension, electrolyte disturbances, perfusion deficits, and early signs of adverse reactions.
What is monitoring vital signs and assessing for medication side effects?