Is it going to be only worse now - 30 years follow up of mortality trends of heart failure mortality in Poland

Abstract

Background: Heart Failure (HF) mortality is still an important problem in European countries. Although in many of them substantial improvement have been noticed over last decades, but there are some premises showing a beginning of unfavorable trend in the last years. The aim of the study was to evaluate the mortality trends in Polish population for the years 1980-2010. Methods: All the data regarding number and causes of death was obtained. With regard to cause of death, we used only data with HF codes as the underlying reason of the event (for the years 1980-1996 - IX Revision; years 1997-2010 - X Revision). Presented data were standardized by European standardization mode per 100000 population. For the purpose of the analysis we limited age of subject to least 45 years of age. Results: Total crude mortality rates for heart failure in 1980 were 21519 and 23008 respectively for women and men, whereas for year 2010 numbers were 23304 and 19558. Age standardized rates per 100000 inhabitants for years 1989-2010 for every 5 years period are presented in the table. There was a significant change in HF mortality trends from decline during the first phase of the study with increasing trends during the last years of observations (p< 0.005 for change of trends for both men and women). The lowest value reached (in 2005) constituted 47% and 41% of baseline numbers for women and men respectively, however climbing up to 59% and 52% by year 2010. Stratification by age groups for both genders brought alike results, with the exception for the youngest groups which showed initial increase in rates for the years 1980-1985. View this table: HF Mortality per 100000 population Conclusion: There was a significant decline in the rates of HF mortality in Polish population for both men and women, showing a maximal reduction of about 50% around year 2005. However during the last 5 years of observation significant increase in HF mortality rates is noticeable with narrowing the gap between men and women. It is unknown if it is a temporal of permanent trend and requires further observation.