[Clinical and therapeutic characteristics in patients with heart failure cared for in an internal medicine department].
BACKGROUND
The Heart Failure (HF) is a very common clinic syndrome in the clinical practise, and a great sanitary social problem. In Spain, it is the main cause of hospitalization in Internal Medicine Services in patients over 65 years old, due to its high comorbidity, in many cases.


OBJECTIVE
To determine the profile of admitted patients with HF to an Internal Medicine Service.


METHODS
It is a retrospective and descriptive study. The following variables were analysed: sex, age, cause of admission, aetiology, risk factors, Framingham diagnostic criteria, type of HF, treatment-on-released, average stay, number of readmissions and the type of ventricular dysfunction (echocardiography). Chi-square test of Pearson or Fisher test were used as statistical methods. P < 0.05 was considered to be statistically relevant.


RESULTS
104 patients were analysed. The percentage of HF was 13.76%. 52.88% were men with an average age of 72.16 +/- 17.78 year. Average age for women was 82.92 +/- 7.24 year. The main cause of admission was dysnea (74%). Hypertension was the principal risk factor (70.13%). When it comes to aetiology, HTA (68.57%) was the main one. Global and left HF (33.65% either) were the most common type of HF. 5.17% of women and 20.69% of men suffered from systolic dysfunction (p < 0.023). 32.76% of women and 41.38% of men had diastolic dysfunction. The base treatment-on-release for the majority of patients consisted of diuretics and digoxin. Patients stayed 15.49 days on average, and the number of readmitted ones came up to 26.67%.


CONCLUSIONS
The diagnosis and treatment of HF in an Internal Medicine Service is acceptable. It will be very important to promote the use of beta blockers and angiotensina-converting enzyme inhibitors.
Fernández Galante
I
I
Servicio de Medicina Interna, Hospital Clínico Universitario, Valladolid. inmajg@gmail.com
González Sarmiento
E
E
D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D005260:Female; D006333:Heart Failure / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000628:therapy*; D006801:Humans; D007388:Internal Medicine; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D013030:Spain