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Little is known about patients with severe symptomatic aortic stenosis (AS) who receive medical management despite evaluation at a heart valve treatment center.We identified patient characteristics associated with medical management, physician-reported reasons for selecting medical management, and patients' perceptions of their involvement and satisfaction with treatment selection.Of 454 patients evaluated for AS at 9 established heart valve treatment centers from December 12, 2013 to August 19, 2014, we included 407 with severe symptomatic AS. Information was collected using medical record review and survey of patients and treating physicians. Of 407 patients, 212 received transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR), 124 received surgical aortic valve replacement (SAVR), and 71 received medical management (no SAVR/TAVR). Thirty-day predicted mortality was higher in patients receiving TAVR (8.7%) or medical management (9.8%) compared with SAVR (3.4%) (P

The risk of rehospitalization is elevated in the immediate post-discharge period and declines over time. It is not known if the extent and timing of risk vary across readmission diagnoses, suggesting that recovery and vulnerability after discharge differ by physiologic system.We compared risk trajectories for major readmission diagnoses in the year after discharge among all Medicare fee-for-service beneficiaries hospitalized with heart failure (HF), acute myocardial infarction (AMI), or pneumonia from 2008-2010.We estimated the daily risk of rehospitalization for 12 major readmission diagnostic categories after accounting for the competing risk of death after discharge. For each diagnostic category, we identified (1) the time required for readmission risk to peak and then decline 50% from maximum values after discharge; (2) the time required for readmission risk to approach plateau periods of minimal day-to-day change; and (3) the extent to which hospitalization risks are higher among patients recently discharged from the hospital compared with the general elderly population.Among >3,000,000 hospitalizations, the yearly rate of rehospitalization was 67.0%, 49.5%, and 55.3% after hospitalization for HF, AMI, and pneumonia, respectively. The extent and timing of risk varied by readmission diagnosis and initial admitting condition. Risk of readmission for gastrointestinal bleeding/anemia peaked particularly late after hospital discharge, occurring 10, 6, and 7 days after hospitalization for HF, AMI, and pneumonia, respectively. Risk of readmission for trauma/injury declined particularly slowly, requiring 38, 20, and 38 days to decline by 50% after hospitalization for HF, AMI, and pneumonia, respectively.Patterns of vulnerability to different conditions that cause rehospitalization vary by time after hospital discharge. This finding suggests that recovery of various physiologic systems occurs at different rates and that post-discharge interventions to minimize vulnerability to specific conditions should be tailored to their underlying risks.

Older patients who undergo mitral valve surgery (MVS) have high 1-year survival rates, but little is known about the experience of survivors. Our objective was to determine trends in 1-year hospital readmission rates and length of stay (LOS) in these individuals.We included 100% of Medicare Fee-for-Service patients ≥65 years of age who underwent MVS between 1999-2010 and survived to 1 year (N = 146,877). We used proportional hazards regression to analyze the post-MVS 1-year readmission rate in each year, mean hospital LOS (after index admission), and readmission rates by subgroups (age, sex, race).The 1-year survival rate among patients undergoing MVS was 81.3%. Among survivors, 49.1% experienced a hospital readmission within 1 year. The post-MVS 1-year readmission rate declined from 1999-2010 (49.5% to 46.9%, P

Heart failure as recognized and treated in typical practice may represent a complex condition that defies discrete categorizations. To illuminate this complexity, we examined treatment strategies for patients hospitalized and treated for decompensated heart failure. We focused on the receipt of medications appropriate for other acute conditions associated with shortness of breath including acute asthma, pneumonia, and exacerbated chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.Using Premier Perspective(®), we studied adults hospitalized with a principal discharge diagnosis of heart failure and evidence of acute heart failure treatment from 2009-2010 at 370 US hospitals. We determined treatment with acute respiratory therapies during the initial 2 days of hospitalization and daily during hospital days 3-5. We also calculated adjusted odds of in-hospital death, admission to the intensive care unit, and late intubation (intubation after hospital day 2). Among 164,494 heart failure hospitalizations, 53% received acute respiratory therapies during the first 2 hospital days: 37% received short-acting inhaled bronchodilators, 33% received antibiotics, and 10% received high-dose corticosteroids. Of these 87,319 hospitalizations, over 60% continued receiving respiratory therapies after hospital day 2. Respiratory treatment was more frequent among the 60,690 hospitalizations with chronic lung disease. Treatment with acute respiratory therapy during the first 2 hospital days was associated with higher adjusted odds of all adverse outcomes.Acute respiratory therapy is administered to more than half of patients hospitalized with and treated for decompensated heart failure. Heart failure is therefore regularly treated as a broader cardiopulmonary syndrome rather than as a singular cardiac condition.