nearly 1 million U.S. adults 18 or older diagnosed with heart failure between 2003 and 2019.
Of those patients, more than a third (38%) were diagnosed in an acute care setting, such as an emergency room or during a hospitalization.
Of the patients diagnosed in such settings, 46% had already displayed potential heart failure symptoms during primary care clinic visits over the previous six months, including swelling of tissues (15%), cough (12%), shortness of breath (11%), and chest pain (11%).
A diagnosis that came very late — when the patient was experiencing a health emergency — was more likely to be the case for women than for men, and for Black versus whites, the study found.
A patient’s income seemed to matter, too: Patients with a net worth under $25,000 were 39% more likely to be diagnosed with heart failure in an ER or hospital than those with a net worth of over $500,000, according to the study published in the journal Circulation: Heart Failure.
The problem is only getting worse: Heart failure diagnoses made in acute care settings rose by 3.2% each year during the 16-year study period, the study authors say.