Springfieldian Debra Habben was diagnosed with congestive heart failure in the last year. CHF is a condition where the heart muscle isn’t pumping blood as well as it should, according to the Mayo Clinic. Blood often backs up, and fluid can build up in the lungs, which causes a patient to feel short of breath.
That fluid retention can lead to hospitalization for CHF patients, including Hobson.
“In July, August and October, I was hospitalized for a total of 15 days due to the fluid retention,” Habben said.
But a new program offered by Mercy Springfield is reducing the time patients are spending in the hospital.
Last September, the fluid management program opened in Mercy’s cardiology clinic at its Heart Hospital in Springfield.
Dr. Sadaf Sohrab, chief medical officer of Mercy Springfield Communities, said CHF patients there have a dedicated nurse navigator, a nurse practitioner and a physician. A person’s primary care provider refers them to the program.
“Their labs are done right there and then, and the labs come back immediately," she said. We give them whatever help they need, whether it's a diuretic, an IV medication, and then we observe them for like a few minutes, 20 minutes or so, and then we send them home. The whole idea is that they can then go home and spend that night in their own bed rather than being in the hospital bed."
She said patients might return to the clinic two or three days in a row, but they get to sleep at home.
The program isn’t for everyone, according to Sohrab. She said it’s for those who don’t require much oxygen but are feeling short of breath – maybe their oral medication isn’t working well enough and they need extra help.
But for Habben, who said she can easily gain up to 60 pounds of fluid, it’s been a life changer.
“The minute this starts happening with me, I feel so good that I can just call them and get in, you know, right away and get started on it, get a, you know, a head start on it before it gets that drastic," she said, "so that's what I'm very pleased about.”
Once a patient is referred to the program by their physician, they’re assessed by a heart failure specialist to determine how many days they need to visit the program for treatment.
Sohrab is working to get the word out about the new program, including educating physicians about it so they can refer patients. It's already helped dozens of people, she said.
"We've had almost 120 patients go through this program, so obviously we know that, in those 120 patients, we were able to prevent a hospitalization," she said. "I mean, there is no doubt those patients would have been admitted if we did not have this clinic."
