ABSTRACT

Introduction: the diagnosis of pulmonary hypertension is associated with greater deterioration of heart failure, as well as a risk of adverse outcomes. Objective: the objective of this study was to analyze the prevalence of pulmonary hypertension and evaluate its prognosis in patients from the Colombian Registry of Heart Failure-RECOLFACA. Material and methods: RECOLFACA included adult outpatients with a diagnosis of heart failure belonging to 60 medical centers in Colombia in the period 2017-2019. The primary outcome was all-cause mortality. A Cox proportional hazards regression model was used to evaluate the factors associated with the primary outcome in patients with HF and pulmonary hypertension. A p value < 0.05 was considered significant. Results: of the 2,528 patients included in RECOLFACA, 1,833 were analyzed in this study because they had sufficient echocardiography reports to confirm or rule out the diagnosis of pulmonary hypertension. 48.6% met the diagnostic criteria for pulmonary hypertension. The diagnoses of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, atrial fibrillation, valvular heart disease, HF and the use of diuretics and anticoagulants were useful predictors for the identification of those patients with HF with preserved ejection fraction and pulmonary hypertension (AUC-ROC: 0.73). Conclusions: pulmonary hypertension is common in patients with heart failure, regardless of their ejection fraction. The differential characteristics of patients with heart failure according to the diagnosis of pulmonary hypertension were highlighted for the first time in a Latin American population. However, additional studies are required evaluating other echocardiographic parameters as predictors of pulmonary hypertension and adverse outcomes in this context.

KEYWORDS

heart failure, pulmonary hypertension, mortality.

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