Health Status in Heart Failure and Cancer: Analysis of the Medicare Health Outcomes Survey 2016-2020.

Background: People with heart failure (HF) and cancer experience impaired physical and mental health status. However, health-related quality of life (HRQOL) has not been directly compared between these conditions in a contemporary population of older people.
Objectives: The authors sought to compare HRQOL in people with HF vs those with lung, colorectal, breast, and prostate cancers.
Methods: The authors performed a pooled analysis of Medicare Health Outcomes Survey data from 2016 to 2020 in participants ≥65 years of age with a self-reported history of HF or active treatment for lung, colon, breast, or prostate cancer. They used the Veterans RAND-12 physical component score (PCS) and mental component score (MCS), which range from 0-100 with a mean score of 50 (based on the U.S. general population) and an SD of 10. The authors used pairwise Student's t-tests to evaluate for differences in PCS and MCS between groups.
Results: Among participants with HF (n = 71,025; 54% female, 16% Black), mean PCS was 29.5 and mean MCS 47.9. Mean PCS was lower in people with HF compared with lung (31.2; n = 4,165), colorectal (35.6; n = 4,270), breast (37.7; n = 14,542), and prostate (39.6; n = 17,670) cancer (all P < 0.001). Participants with HF had a significantly lower mean MCS than those with lung (31.2), colon (50.0), breast (52.0), and prostate (53.0) cancer (all P < 0.001).
Conclusions: People with HF experience worse HRQOL than those with cancer actively receiving treatment. The pervasiveness of low HRQOL in HF underscores the need to implement evidence-based interventions that target physical and mental health status and scale multidisciplinary clinics.
Competing Interests: Funding Support and Author Disclosures Dr Ahmad was supported by grants from the National Institutes of Health/National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute (K23HL155970) and the American Heart Association (856917). All other authors have reported that they have no relationships relevant to the contents of this paper to disclose.
(Copyright © 2024 American College of Cardiology Foundation. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)