One-year mortality in COPD patients after severe exacerbation

Abstract

Introduction: One-year mortality in COPD patients is reported to be between 4-43% depending on group examined and patients9 characteristics. Mortality shows a downward trend in recent studies. Aim: To find out the one-year mortality in COPD patients who survived severe exacerbation and its correlation with presence of diabetes mellitus (DM), metabolic syndrome (MS), arterial hypertension (AH) vitamin D status (VD) as well as patients9 characteristics. Methods: 152 COPD patients hospitalized for severe exacerbation were assessed for vitamin D status, DM, AH and MS and number of exacerbations in previous year. All patients completed CAT and mMRC questionnaires and underwent spirometry. One-year mortality was established from National death register. Results: One-year mortality is 7,2% (11/152). DM, MS and VD are not predictors for one-year mortality. However there is a trend for increased mortality in patients with DM (9,4% vs 5,1%, p=0.302) and in patients with AH (8,7% vs 2,1%, p=0.138). There is increased mortality in patients with mMRC>=2 (11,1 vs 0%, p=0.013) and trend for the group with CAT>=10 (8,7 vs 0%, p=0.133). The presence of severe exacerbation in the previous year is a risk factor for mortality (11,4% vs 1,4%, p=0.014). There is a trend for increased mortality in the group FEV1 Conclusions: This study finds relatively low one-year mortality in COPD patients after surviving severe exacerbation. Risk factors for increased mortality are age, FEV1 value, severe exacerbation in previous year and reduced quality of life.