New UCLA-led study results revealed that between 27 percent and 67 percent of heart failure patients were not prescribed the recommended medications recommended for them under guidelines set by the American College of Cardiology, American Heart Association and Heart Failure Society of America. The research also found that doctors frequently prescribe medications at doses lower than those recommended by the guidelines, especially for older people, those with kidney disease, those with worsening symptoms or those who were recently hospitalized for heart failure. Further study is needed to determine why people in those four groups specifically were prescribed lower-than-recommended doses.
‘Many heart failure patients do not receive the medications recommended for them, years after initial study.’
Tweet it Now
And when patients did receive the medications, they were generally at a lower-than-recommended dose. Less than 25 percent of patients simultaneously received all three medication types, and only 1 percent received the target doses of all three medication types. BACKGROUND
About 5.7 million people in the United States have heart failure, according to a 2016 report by the American Heart Association. Heart failure is associated with a lower quality of life and frequent hospitalizations, and it contributes to more than 300,000 deaths each year in the U.S. In half of people with heart failure, the disease is caused by a weak heart muscle that prevents the heart from ejecting a normal amount of blood with each heartbeat, a condition called reduced ejection fraction.
Several medications have been proven in large clinical trials to help people with heart failure and reduced ejection fraction live longer and feel better. The new study sought to determine if there have been improvements in prescribing practice as well as which patients are most likely to receive less medication than recommended.
METHOD
Advertisement
IMPACT
Advertisement
Source-Eurekalert