What is digoxin?
Digoxin is a type of drug used to treat heart failure and heart rhythm. It is a cleaned heart glycoside, which means that it belongs to a group of drugs commonly referred to as digitalis, containing potentially poisonous substances extracted from a conventional fox plant. Digoxin is one of the examples of what are known as inotropic agents, which are medicines that directly affect the contraction of the heart muscle. Its affecting heart muscles leads to an increase in contraction strength, increasing the output of the failing heart. In conditions where the heart rhythm is irregular, digoxin can help slow down and calm the rhythm. In the treatment of heart failure, the use of digoxin is generally reserved for patients who also have a disorder known as atrial fibrillation, where the upper chambers of the heart beat too quickly and irregular. It is also used sometimes in the case of a serious heart failure where other medicines did not work.
uOther disorders that disrupt the heart rhythm, known as supraventricular tachycardia, the heart tissue above the lower ventricles or the chamber, suppresses the normal pacemaker tissue, causing a sudden rupture of a fast but regular heart rhythm. This can cause symptoms such as palpitations, dizziness and breathless. Symptoms can be mild enough to live, but if not, digoxin can be beneficial. Instead of drugs, a treatment called catheter ablation is sometimes used, and the wire and the stream along it to destroy the area of abnormal tissue of the pacemaker.
Some people may have atrial fibrillation without heart failure and fast, random heart rate can lead to symptoms of pain and palpitation on the chest, as well as a sense of dizziness and short breath. Atrial fibrillation can increase the risk of a person to experience a stroke. For this heart condition, digoxin treatment is one of the possibilities, but other medicines are commonly used with drugs to prevent clotting toRiv and electric cardioversion, which is a technique where electric shocks are used to restore normal heart rhythm.
Digoxin can cause adverse effects such as impaired heart rate, nausea, blurred vision, dizziness and diarrhea. People with low drug tolerance are more at risk of these toxic effects. Low tolerance is more common in elderly people, people with hypothyroidism, where the thyroid gland is insufficient and most often patients undergoing treatment with diuretic drugs who may have low potassium levels. In mild cases of toxicity, the drug is simply downloaded, but in more severe cases the stomach is an outfit and intravenous fluids are given together with drugs to regulate heart rate.