Abstract
Background: The effect of mitral regurgitation (MR) severity on heart failure (HF) hospitalization and mortality in individuals with a preserved ejection fraction (LVEF) and no prior HF history is uncertain. Methods: Transthoracic echocardiogram (TTE) reports from patients with an LVEF > 50% at our institution were linked to complete Medicare inpatient claims, 2003-2017. Patients with HF hospitalization within the 12 months prior to TTE were excluded. We evaluated the relationship of baseline MR severity and time to the composite of all-cause mortality or HF hospitalization using the Kaplan-Meier technique. Secondary outcomes included the individual components of all-cause mortality and HF hospitalization, adjusting for the competing risk of death with Fine-Gray methods. Results: A total of 18,315 individuals met inclusion criteria (77.6 ±7.7 years, 54.3% female). Over a median follow-up time of 6.5 (IQR 3.0 to 10.2) years, the primary endpoint occurred in 7566 individuals (50.6%) of whom 6,927 (37.8%) died and 1703 (13.9%) were admitted for HF at a median of 1.4 (IQR 0.2 to 4.3) years and 1.6 (IQR 0.2 to 4.3) years respectively ( Figure ). After multivariable adjustment, MR severity was not associated with the primary or secondary outcome at 1-, 3-, 5-, or 10-years after TTE (p > 0.05 for all). Mitral valve prolapse (MVP) was associated with decreased risk of the primary outcome at 1-year and 3-years (interaction p-value = 0.04 for both). Jet eccentricity did not impact the observed relationship (interaction p-value > 0.05). Conclusions: In this large, single institution echocardiographic study of individuals with preserved ejection fraction and no prior history of HF, MR severity was not associated with an increased risk of all-cause mortality or HF hospitalization. Presence of MVP was associated with decreased risk of the primary outcome with increasing MR severity.
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