Study Finds Infection-Related Hospitalizations Linked to Increase Rate of Heart Failure
An NIH-funded study has found that adults who were hospitalized for a severe infection were more than twice as likely to develop heart failure years later. The findings, published in the Journal of the American Heart Association, underscore the importance of measures that help prevent severe infections.
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The study, part of the NHLBI-funded Atherosclerosis Risk in Communities (ARIC) Study, followed 14,468 adults aged 45-64 for up to 31 years, from 1987 to 2018. None had heart failure when the study began.
The researchers found that individuals who experienced an infection-related hospitalization had a 2.35-times higher risk of developing heart failure at an average time of seven years after surviving the hospitalization, compared to those who did not get an infection. The researchers adjusted for sociodemographic and health-related factors and included different infection types in their assessment.
Heart failure occurs when the heart is unable to pump enough blood to the body’s organs and tissues. While there are many different kinds, the study focused mainly on heart failure with preserved ejection fraction (HFpEF), which occurs when the left side of the heart is too stiff to fully relax between heartbeats, and heart failure with reduced ejection fraction (HFrEF), which occurs when the left ventricle is too weak to pump out enough blood to the body.
The researchers discovered that infections requiring hospitalization were associated with an increased risk of both conditions. Notably, the risk was nearly three times higher for HFpEF, the most common form of heart failure among people over age 65 and the one with the most limited treatment options. Nearly half of participants experienced an infection-related hospitalization emphasizing the potentially large impact of severe infections on the heart health of older adults.
While the study only found an association between severe infections and heart failure, patients still should consider common-sense approaches that keep severe infections at bay. Future research could explore the potential for incorporating infection history into heart failure risk assessments and patient management strategies.