Abstract 11754: Trends in Cardiovascular Mortality Before and During the COVID-19 Pandemic

Abstract

Introduction: The COVID-19 pandemic has placed increased strain on the US healthcare system, limiting the prevention and treatment of cardiovascular diseases. Previous studies have noted an increase in excess mortality among patients with chronic medical conditions during the pandemic. However, these trends have not been fully explored in patients with acute pulmonary embolism (APE) and cardiovascular disease. Methods: Death-certificate data from the CDC Wonder database were used to calculate death rates of APE, heart failure (HF), and myocardial infarction (MI) from 1999 to 2022. Training data from 1999 - 2019 were used to create a prediction model that was used to calculate excess mortality during the COVID-19 pandemic stratified by disease, year, sex, and race. Results: Between 1999 and 2022, the most common studied cause of death was HF followed by MI and APE. All studied causes of death occurred at higher rates during 2020 compared to 2019. For all included diseases, there was a positive correlation between monthly excess mortality and total US covid deaths. APE had the highest percent excess mortality (86.5%) followed by MI (31.6%), and HF (16.2%) (Figure 1). When stratified by sex and race, males and black individuals experienced greater cumulative excess mortality across all included diseases (Figure 2). Conclusions: COVID-19 has had a heterogenous effect on different cardiovascular diseases both directly through infection and indirectly through increased strain on the healthcare system. Understanding the impact of COVID-19 on CVD burden can help guide public policy in future health care-system stressors.