Final answer:
Symptoms of CHF in an infant include temperature instability, apnea, bradycardia, hypotension, difficulty feeding, and irritability, progressing to more severe signs like seizures, bulging fontanel, and opisthotonos, with complications such as hydrops potentially being fatal.
Step-by-step explanation:
Symptoms of Congestive Heart Failure (CHF) in Infants
The symptoms of CHF in a few weeks old infant can include a range of clinical signs. Some of the early onset symptoms are temperature instability, apnea (cessation of breathing), bradycardia (slow heart rate), hypotension, difficulty feeding, irritability, and limpness.
When the infant is asleep, waking them up may prove difficult. As the condition progresses, symptoms can also encompass seizures, a bulging fontanel (the soft spot on the head), a stiff neck, hemiparesis (weakness on one side of the body), and opisthotonos (the body becomes rigid with an arched back and the head thrown backward). In severe cases, CHF in infants may lead to complications such as anemia, edema, enlarged liver or spleen, and hydrops (fluid in body cavities), which can be fatal.