Mortality and Readmission Rates After Heart Failure: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

OBJECTIVE: The current work aimed to examine the rates of and risk factors for mortality and readmission after heart failure (HF). SETTING: A systematic search was carried out in PubMed, the Cochrane Library, and EMBASE to identify eligible reports. The random-effects model was utilized to evaluate the pooled results. PARTICIPANTS: A total of 27 studies with 515,238 participants were finally meta-analysed. The HF patients had an average age of 76.3 years, with 51% of the sample being male, in the pooled analysis. PRIMARY AND SECONDARY OUTCOME MEASURES: The outcome measures were 30-day and 1-year readmission rates, mortality, and risk factors for readmission and mortality. RESULTS: The effect sizes for readmission and mortality were estimated as the mean and 95% confidence interval (CI). The estimated 30-day and 1-year all-cause readmission rates were 0.19 (95% CI 0.14–0.23) and 0.53 (95% CI 0.46–0.59), respectively, while the all-cause mortality rates were 0.14 (95% CI 0.10–0.18) and 0.29 (95% CI 0.25–0.33), respectively. Comorbidities were highly prevalent in individuals with HF. CONCLUSION: Heart failure hospitalization is followed by high readmission and mortality rates.