Organ Failure – Signs and Symptoms

The organ of the soul is the human voice. This proverb tries to show that whatever your mind thinks can be told by talking through the mouth. You can express your thoughts through your voice; thus, it acts as the organ for your soul. The organ is also highlighted in this proverb.

What is Organ Failure?

Organ failure refers to a condition in which one or many organs fail to perform their job properly for the needs of the body. Organ failure can occur suddenly or gradually. If any of the important organs malfunction or fail to function, then you will require life support or an organ transplant to replace that organ. The liver, kidneys, heart, brain, lungs, and small intestine are your most important organs. 

Signs of Organ Failure

You can see a few signs of organ failure. The signs of organ failure are:

• A yellow-coloured tint on your skin and eyes (jaundice due to liver failure).
• A blue-coloured tint on your lips and under your fingernails (cyanosis because of heart failure or respiratory failure). 

Symptoms of Organ Failure

Organ failure shows many symptoms. Here are some of the symptoms of organ failure :

• Weakness, faintness, or fatigue
• Difficulty concentrating, confusion
• Loss of appetite
• Nausea and vomiting
• Fast or irregular heartbeat
• Fever and chills
• Loss of consciousness or drowsiness
• Persistent chest pain or abdominal pain
• Fast or shallow breathing
• Swelling in your extremities or in your abdomen

Causes of Organ Failure

There are many reasons why organ failure occurs. Here are some of the causes of organ failure:

1) Long-Time Diseases

Chronic diseases can cause damage to your organs over a period of time. If you have had a disease for a long time, it may not go away easily, though there might be many ways to slow down the destruction it causes. A few diseases might occur during your birth itself, and others might happen in the later part of your life.

• Chronic inflammatory bowel diseases like chronic intestinal motility disorders and Crohn’s disease can lead to chronic intestinal failure.
• Chronic heart diseases, like coronary artery disease and congenital heart disease, could result in heart failure.
• Chronic respiratory diseases like asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) could result in chronic respiratory failure.
• Chronic degenerative brain diseases, like Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s disease, could lead to chronic brain failure (dementia). 
• Chronic liver diseases, like fatty liver disease and hepatitis C, are the most common causes of chronic liver failure.
• Chronic kidney diseases, like glomerulonephritis and polycystic kidney disease, can result in chronic kidney failure.

2) Injury

A serious injury to one of your organs might result in acute organ failure. injury, there might be a chance of chronic organ failure due to the permanent damage, even though your organ recovers. It might make your organ not perform its work well. A shock state might be triggered by a severe injury that affects your whole body. This will stop the flow of blood to all your organs. This can result in acute multiple-organ failure. 

Moreover, the surgical removal of a large part of your small intestine (short bowel syndrome) due to a disease is a general reason for permanent small intestinal failure. Traumatic brain injury can cause brain death (acute brain failure). 

3) Toxic Infections

Toxin-induced organ injuries can be both acute and chronic; they affect any or all of your important organs. Environmental substances, bacterial infections in your body, or the substances you take can cause toxic poisoning. If your liver and kidneys fail, then the toxins might develop and injure your other organs. This is because the liver and kidneys only help filter the low levels of toxins in your blood each day.

Bacterial infections generate toxins as byproducts, which might impact individual organs or all if they go into your blood. These bacterial infections in your bloodstream can result in sepsis and shock. 

Several issues, like chronic liver failure (toxic hepatitis), chronic brain failure (alcohol-related brain damage), chronic heart failure (alcohol-induced cardiomyopathy), or chronic intestinal and kidney diseases, can be caused by chronic drug or alcohol use. An overdose of substances or acute alcohol poisoning could result in acute heart failure, acute liver failure, or acute kidney injury.

Environmental toxins could result in health issues like chronic respiratory failure, kidney disease, liver disease, or degenerative brain diseases.

4) Loss of Blood

The blood flow helps retain oxygen for your organs. If anything can stop the blood flow to your organ, then it will not have the oxygen required for its function (hypoxia). This can result in acute or chronic organ failure, depending on how the blood supply is stopped.

Ischemia is a condition of loss of blood supply to a particular organ. This could be a severe, slow, or gradual loss. Then, shock is a sudden loss of blood flow throughout your body. 

Chronic heart failure is generally caused by ischemic cardiomyopathy. Any organ with ischemia could face inflammation and then tissue death, either quickly or slowly. An ischemic stroke in the brain could result in acute brain damage and brain death in a few cases.

Shock refers to an acute loss of blood flow. It is caused by any of the following issues: heart damage (cardiogenic shock), bloodstream infection (septic shock), cardiac obstruction (obstructive shock), and an allergic reaction (anaphylactic shock). This could lead to acute multiple-organ failure.

5) Loss of Oxygen

A major cardiac event, like a heart attack, stroke, or cardiac arrest, could cut off his or her blood and oxygen supply to the remaining organs. It could cause complications such as acute heart failure, brain damage, or multiple organ failure. The remaining organs will also die if your heart or brain stem dies.

Different Types of Organ Failure

There are different types of organ failure; they are: 

1) Heart: The heart is responsible for providing oxygen-rich blood to all the other organs in your body. So, the heart failure will affect the whole body. Acute heart failure is a fast decrease in heart function, while congestive heart failure grows over time. 

2) Liver: The liver does necessary functions to support life, like filtering toxins from your blood. The failure of the liver could be acute or chronic.

3) Kidneys: Kidneys help remove waste from your blood, thus balancing your fluids and electrolytes. Kidney failure might be chronic or acute.

4) Lungs: The major part of the respiratory system is the lungs. It supplies oxygen to all the tissues in your body. Respiratory failure can either be short-term or long-term.

5) Small intestine: The small intestine is the necessary organ to absorb more nutrition from your food, thus helping your body to operate. If your small intestine fails to work, then the result is either malnutrition or starvation. 

6) Brain: Your brain instructs all of your organs how to function. Degenerative brain diseases can lead to chronic and progressive brain failure. Acute brain failure is brain death, so when your brain or brainstem dies, the remaining organs will also become inactive. 

Different conditions might result in any or several organ failures at once. When there is more than one organ failure, then it might be called:

• Total organ failure.
• Multiple organ dysfunction syndrome.
• Multiple organ failure.

Diagnosis of Organ Failure

The doctor might use different tests to diagnose organ failure in various organs.

The diagnosis of organ failure might include the following :

Liver function tests and kidney function tests help calculate the chemicals in your blood and urine that provide the doctor with details about the organs’ functioning. They may also continue with a renal scan or liver stiffness scan (elastography).

You might be asked to undergo blood tests for malnutrition causes and then an enteroscopy for your small intestine. This enteroscopy could help diagnose small intestinal failure caused by malabsorption or pseudo-obstruction.

An echocardiogram is the test used to measure your heart’s ejection fraction, which helps in finding out how well it’s functioning.

Neurocognitive testing and brain scans could diagnose any damage to the brain.

A pulmonary function test will help check the workings of your respiratory system. A pulse oximetry (pulse ox) or arterial blood gas test could also calculate your blood oxygen levels.

Some imaging tests of the organs, like an ultrasound or CT scan, can help detect the issue.

Organ Failure Treatment

For acute organ failure, your doctor will give you help to control your condition. These might include:

• IV fluids
• Blood transfusion
• IV nutrition
• Antibiotics
• Oxygen therapy or mechanical ventilation.
• Vasopressor medications to increase blood flow
• Dialysis
• In a rare case, an organ transplant can cure acute organ failure

For chronic organ failure, your doctor will suggest many methods. They may include :

• Some diets and lifestyles change to slow or reverse the path of chronic liver failure. If the condition reaches the end stage, then it might require a liver transplant.
• Dialysis helps slow down the development of chronic kidney failure. Again, if it is in the end stage, then it necessitates a kidney transplant.
• Your doctor might recommend different breathing methods for chronic respiratory failure, as they will help you provide more oxygen. But, at the final stage, you require a lung transplant or permanent mechanical ventilation.
• Some medications treat chronic heart failure and its causes, like coronary artery disease. But in the final stages, heart failure surgery options use different implanted devices to make your heart function, and then, finally, you need a heart transplant.
• Your doctor might prefer parenteral nutrition for the chronic intestinal failure condition. You can follow parenteral nutrition for life, but it might result in complications. You might also need an intestinal transplant.
• Some medications are needed to treat the symptoms that support dementia. But, currently, there is no treatment to slow down or reverse its progress. But there is no treatment for brain death.

Conclusion

Organ failure is a sudden or gradual condition that causes one or more organs to stop working. It can be caused by many factors, like chronic diseases, injuries, toxic infections, etc. Weakness, drowsiness, confusion, loss of appetite, nausea, irregular heartbeat, etc., are some of the symptoms of organ failure.

A yellow colour tint on your skin and a blue colour tint on your lips might show that you have organ failure. For each organ failure, various tests might be conducted to diagnose the underlying cause. Depending on the type of acute or chronic organ failure, the treatment might differ.

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