Week 8 Case

Chief complaint: â€œI’m here for a medication refill because I ran out of my medicines”.

HPI:  Mrs. Allen is a 68-year-old African American who presents to the clinic for prescription refills. The patient indicates that she has noticed shortness of breath which started about 3 months ago. The SOB gets worse with exertion, especially when she is walking fast, and it is resolved when she is resting. She reports that she is also bothered by shortness of breath that wakes her up intermittently during her sleep. Her symptoms of shortness of breath resolve after sitting upright on 3 pillows. She also has lower leg edema pitting 1+ which started 2 weeks ago. She indicates that she often feels light headed at times with intermittent syncope episodes while going up a flight of stairs, but it resolves after sitting down to rest. She has not tried any over the counter medications at home.

She started taking her medications, but failed to refill the prescriptions because she cannot afford the medications as she only works part-time and lives alone. In addition, she reports that she does not think taking all these medications would help her condition anyway.

Questions:

1.    According to the ACC/AHA guidelines, what medications should this patient be prescribed?

2.    Does he need medication(s) given his history of MI?

3.   Considering that you have a case study, you only need 2 posts for this discussion board, 1 initial and 1 reply. As usual, all posts must be supported by at least 2 peer reviewed references and all paragraphs must be cited.