Peak oxygen uptake is a strong prognostic predictor for pulmonary hypertension due to left heart disease

BACKGROUND: Pulmonary hypertension in left heart disease (PH-LHD), which includes combined post- and precapillary PH (Cpc-PH) and isolated postcapillary PH (Ipc-PH), differs significantly in prognosis. We aimed to assess whether cardiopulmonary exercise testing (CPET) predicts the long-term survival of patients with PH-LHD. METHODS: A single-center observational cohort enrolled 89 patients with PH-LHD who had undergone right heart catherization and CPET (mean pulmonary arterial pressure > 20 mm Hg and pulmonary artery wedge pressure ≥ 15 mm Hg) between 2013 and 2021. A receiver operating characteristic curve was plotted to determine the cutoff value of all-cause death. Survival was estimated using the Kaplan–Meier method and analyzed using the log-rank test. The Cox proportional hazards model was performed to determine the association between CPET and all-cause death. RESULTS: Seventeen patients died within a mean of 2.2 ± 1.3 years. Compared with survivors, nonsurvivors displayed a significantly worse 6-min walk distance, workload, exercise time and peak oxygen consumption (VO(2))/kg with a trend of a lower oxygen uptake efficiency slope (OUES) adjusted by Bonferroni’s correction. Multivariate Cox regression revealed that the peak VO(2)/kg was significantly associated with all-cause death after adjusting for Cpc-PH/Ipc-PH. Compared with Cpc-PH patients with a peak VO(2)/kg ≥ 10.7 ml kg(−1) min(−1), Ipc-PH patients with a peak VO(2)/kg < 10.7 ml kg(−1) min(−1) had a worse survival (P < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: The peak VO(2)/kg is independently associated with all-cause death in patients with PH-LHD. The peak VO(2)/kg can also be analyzed together with Cpc-PH/Ipc-PH to better indicate the prognosis of patients with PH-LHD. SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: The online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1186/s12872-022-02574-0.