CHDD Flashcards
Describe Thyroid disease
The thyroid gland is a butterfly-shaped gland at the base of your neck. It releases chemicals into your bloodstream. These chemicals control the rate of activities, such as how fast your burn calories and how fast your heart beats.
In hyperthyroidism, you have too much of these chemicals, so these activities happen at a faster rate. This why you might feel your heart racing, or you might lose weight if you have hyperthyroidism.
In hypothyroidism, you have too little of these chemicals, so these activities happen at a slower rate. This why you might have a slow heart rate, put on weight, and feel tired if you have hypothyroidism.
Describe Diabetes
Food raises the levels of sugar in the blood. We get sugars when our body breaks down the carbohydrates from our diet, like from bread and rice. We need this sugar for energy. We also need a chemical in our blood called insulin. Insulin is the key to open our cells and let sugar into our cells. This makes sure we have enough energy in our cells and that the level of sugar in the blood flowing around our body isn’t too high.
In diabetes, there is not enough insulin or it is not working. This means sugar will stay in the blood. If blood sugar levels get too high, you can feel tired because your cells aren’t getting enough energy. The body starts to break down fat to get energy so you might lose weight too. The body decides there is too much sugar, so it tries to get rid of it by making you pee. This might make you more thirsty.
Over a long period of time, diabetes can damage important parts of the body like your kidney, heart, and eyes. But with the right treatment, people with diabetes can live a normal life and have a low risk of these complications.
Describe DVT ?
Deep vein thrombosis is when a blood clot forms in a vein that is deep inside your body, usually in the lower leg.
A blood clot is a clump of blood that has turned solid. A blood clot can block the way for blood to get through and get to other parts of your body. It is like a big car crash that stops all the other cars from going where they need to go.
The build up of blood can cause your leg to swell up and hurt.
To treat this, we want to stop the clot from getting bigger, make sure it doesn’t spread to other parts of the body and to try and make sure this does not happen again.
Describe PE ?
The lungs are important for breathing.
Like all your important organs, it has a blood supply to keep it running. This blood supply can get blocked by a blood clot.
A blood clot is a clump of blood that has turned solid.
If your lungs don’t get enough blood because the blood cannot pass the clot, this can cause symptoms such as shortness of breath and chest pain.
To treat this, our aim is to break up the clot so that your blood can flow normally again, and to stop this from happening again.
Describe AF ?
Your heart is a muscle that pumps blood in your body. Your heart is actually very similar to a small house in that it has four rooms, each of which has its walls, own doors, electric and plumbing.
Normally, the heart beats in a regular rhythm. There is an area in a heart that sends electrical signals to make the heartbeat. In atrial fibrillation, there are multiple electrical signals, so the heart gets confused and beats randomly. If the hearts beats too fast this can be dangerous.
With each heartbeat, the heart is designed to completely empty of blood. But if the heart beats too fast, there isn’t enough time for the heart to empty completely. If the blood accumulates in the heart, a blood clot could form. A blood clot is a clump of blood that has turned solid. If this clot travels to your brain, it could lead to a stroke.
When your heart isn’t pumping blood properly, it can make you feel dizzy, tired and short of breath. We can give medication to prevent a blood clot from forming and to try and control the heart beats.
Describe anaemia ?
When you breathe, you take in oxygen from the air. The oxygen goes into your lungs. You need a way to get the oxygen to the rest of the body.
Blood flows around your body like a river. Your blood carries the oxygen around the body, but the oxygen needs something to hang on to. If your blood is like a river, red blood cells are the boats that carry the oxygen around the body.
Anaemia is when you don’t have enough red blood cells. If you don’t have enough red blood cells, you can’t carry enough oxygen around the body. This can make you feel tired because your body can’t make enough energy without oxygen. If you don’t get enough oxygen to your brain, you can get headaches, struggle to concentrate and feel dizzy.
Describe hypertension ?
The blood in your body flows all around your body through pipes which we call blood vessels. Just like the pipes in your central heating system, if the pressure gets too high, the pipes and other organs become damaged. And like your central heating system, if the pressure is high, you won’t notice a thing until the system bursts. High blood pressure can lead to serious problems like a heart attack, stroke and kidney disease. By controlling your blood pressure, we are trying to prevent that damage.
Describe HF ?
The heart is a muscle that works like a pump. Its main job is to pump blood throughout your body.
Heart failure occurs when your heart is no longer strong enough to provide your body with all the blood and oxygen it needs. This happens because your heart has become damaged or weakened. When this occurs, your heart works harder than normal and less efficiently. This increased effort can cause physical changes in the heart over time, such as thickening of the walls of the heart.
Heart failure does NOT mean that your heart will suddenly stop working or that you are about to die. It means that your heart must work harder to keep the blood flowing to the rest of your body. It means the heart does not pump as well as it should.
We need to make it easier for the heart to pump. One of the ways we can do this is by controlling the amount of blood going into your heart. If your heart has to pump less blood at a time, the less it will become tired and exhausted and the better it will work.
Describe hypercholesterolaemia
Cholesterol is a fatty substance in your blood. Cholesterol can build up in the tubes that carry blood around your body and make fatty deposits. Over time, these fatty deposits can grow bigger and bigger. These fatty deposits are a bit like a silently growing volcano. Many are stable and do nothing. Others can sometimes start to slow the flow of blood around the body. But in other cases, it can be serious – like a volcano, one day it might erupt and cause a lot of damage which could end up being fatal. It can cause a heart attack or a stroke. The problem is that it is difficult to tell the stable safe ones from those that are dangerous, so to be safe, we try to make sure your cholesterol levels are not too high so less of these fatty deposits form.
What is good cholesterol?
Good cholesterol is a special type of cholesterol that helps to get rid of fatty deposits.
Describe asthma ?
The lungs are like a set of tubes, which split into smaller tubes. These tubes are normally elastic and flexible, and the tubes are wide open. In asthma, your breathing tubes are more sensitive than normal. This means that some things, like pollen or pet hair, can trigger them to close up and get filled with sticky mucus. When this happens, it can be hard to breathe. This can make your chest feel tight as well. Because it is hard to breathe, you might not be able to get enough oxygen into your lungs. So, we need to try open your breathing tubes back up.
There’s no cure currently, but there are simple treatments that can help keep the symptoms under control, so it does not have a big impact on your life.
Describe COPD ?
The lungs are like a set of tubes, which split into smaller tubes. These tubes are normally elastic and flexible, and the tubes are wide open. In chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, the breathing tubes are damaged and narrowed, so it is harder to get air in and out. This can make you feel breathless and wheezy. The main cause of damage to the lungs causing COPD is smoking.
The damage to the lungs caused by COPD is permanent, but treatment can help slow down the progression of the condition. The breathing problems tend to get gradually worse over time and can limit your normal activities, but treatment can keep it under control.
The most important thing you can do in COPD is stop smoking, as smoking makes it much worse. We can try to use inhalers and medicines to help make breathing easier
Describe peptic ulcer disease ?
The stomach is an organ that has walls. When you eat, your stomach makes acid to help break down the food. To protect the stomach walls from this acid, we have a lining between the acid and the stomach walls. If this lining layer wears down, this allows the stomach acid to eat away at the stomach wall, causing an ulcer. This can cause pain in your stomach.
To help with this pain, we can try to lower the amount of acid in your stomach with medication.
Describe gallstones ?
The gallbladder is a small pouch-like organ that lives in the top right of your tummy, just below the liver. It stores juices that help to digest fat. When you eat, the gallbladder squeezes, and pumps these juices into your bowel.
Gallstones usually form when there is too much cholesterol in these juices. These gallstones may break down on their own, but they can also get bigger. When the gallbladder squeezes to release its juice, one of the gallstones can get caught in the narrow opening of the gallbladder, and cause pain.
We can give painkillers to help with the pain but in severe cases, we normally treat this by removing the gallstones and the gallbladder that contains them.
Describe AKI ?
We have two kidneys in our body.
The kidney is like a filter, removing waste and toxins from the blood. This waste and toxins come out in your pee.
Acute kidney injury, or AKI, is when your kidneys are damaged, and the kidneys suddenly stops working properly.
If the kidneys don’t do their job properly, you get a build-up of waste and toxins in your blood, because the kidneys aren’t removing them. This can affect the ability of other organs to work properly. If this isn’t dealt with, the kidneys might shut down completely, leading to kidney failure.
Describe CKD ?
We have two kidneys in our body. The kidney is like a filter, removing waste and toxins from the blood. This waste and toxins come out in your pee.
Chronic kidney disease is when the kidneys stop working properly over time. We can keep an eye on your kidney function and even though there is no cure, there are many things we can do to try stop it from getting worse.
