Anatomy
Two large venous structures that return oxygen-poor blood to the heart.
What is the superior vena cava and the inferior vena cava?
What is an EKG?
What is palpitations?
What is myocardial infarction and a stroke?
A patient taking warfarin's INR is 4.5. The nurse knows the normal range is 2-3. The nurse may observe what symptom in the patient?
What is increased bleeding?
The patient may have black, tarry stools, dizziness, joint pain or swelling, and unexplained abdominal pain.
The valve blood passes through when moving from the right atrium to the right ventricle.
What is the tricuspid valve?
The condition that causes the atrium to fibrillate with ineffective conduction. There are no p-waves on the EKG.
What is atrial fibrillation?
What is a cardiac arrhythmia?
What is an anticoagulant?
The patient asks if it is okay to to take ibuprofen for pain and omeprazole for heartburn while taking Warfarin. You know that ...
What is ibuprofen and omeprazole potentiate or increase the effect of warfarin?
Both of these medications can increase the effect of warfarin, which increases the INR and increases bleeding.
The artery blood travels through to become re-oxygenated.
What is the pulmonary artery?
The ventricular rate in afib RVR is conduced by what node?
What is the atrioventricular node?
What is tachycardia?
The patient should decrease the consumption of what to reduce the risk of afib reoccurance.
What is alcohol?
What is Warfarin or direct oral anticoagulants (DOACs)?
DOAC examples - dabigatran (Pradaxa), rivaroxaban (Xarelto), apixaban (Eliquis), and edoxaban (Lixiana).
The time when the heart relaxes. Also known as pre-load because it is filling and stretching the ventricles to 'pre-load' them with blood.
What is diastole?
The condition when a patient has atrial fibrillation and the ventricles create a rapid, irregular response.
What is atrial fibrillation with rapid ventricular rate?
When taking the patient's apical pulse you notice that the heart rate is slow and then fast and then slow again. You note it is irregular. The condition you may suspect is...
The type of medication prescribed to control the heart rate of a patient in afib.
What is beta blockers (ex. metoprolol), calcium channel blockers (ex. diltiazem or verapamil) or digoxin?
These medications help to slow the atrioventricular node.
The laboratory test a patient taking Warfarin must check on a regular basis.
What is the international normalized ratio (INR)?
INR is a lab value based on the patient's prothrombin time (PT) it calculated by dividing the patient's PT with the control PT.
The node that is the main control of the impulse of the heart. Often called the 'pacemaker of the heart'.
What is the sinoatrial (SA) node?
What is low cardiac output?
CO = SV * HR; Even though the heart rate can be high in afib RVR, the stroke volume is low because the left ventricle is pumping less blood out at the end of systole contractions.
The patient's blood pressure is suddenly 85/43 mmHg and their heart rate is irregular moving between 70 bpm to 150 bpm to 95 bpm and so forth. The patient is experiencing...
What is afib RVR with hypotension?
The medical procedure a patient may undergo with persistent afib that does not respond to drug therapy.
What is cardiac ablation?
The patient is admitted to the hospital for an elective surgery. The nurse tells the patient he should stop taking Warfarin (Coumadin) 1 week before the surgery and start taking enoxaparin (Lovenox). Enoxaprin is a subcutaneous injection. Where and how does the nurse give the medicaiton?
What is in the fatty tissue at a 45 to 90 degree angle and hold pressure over the injection site?