• E Ceriani, G Casazza, J Peta, D Torzillo, S Furlotti, and C Cogliati.
• Department of Internal Medicine, L. Sacco Hospital, University of Milan, Milan, Italy. elisa.ceriani@live.com.
• Intern Emerg Med. 2020 Jun 1; 15 (4): 719-724.

AimsRecent studies have established the role of residual congestion evaluated by lung ultrasound in estimating short-term risk of readmission or death in patients admitted for heart failure (HF) decompensation. However, if lung ultrasounds maintain a prognostic role of in long-term survival is still unknown. Aim of our study was to evaluate if residual congestion could predict all-cause mortality during 4 year follow up in a cohort of unselected patients admitted for acute decompensated HF.MethodsOne-hundred fifty patients were enrolled. The anterolateral chest was scanned to evaluate the presence of B-lines. A sonographic score was calculated attributing 1 to each positive sector (≥ 3 B-lines). Clinical, biochemical and echocardiographic data were recorded. A Cox proportional hazard regression analysis was performed to evaluate the association between variables and 4-year survival.ResultsDuring the follow-up, 86 patients (58%) died. Univariate analysis showed a significant correlation between the sonographic score at discharge and events occurrence at long term follow up (HR 1.21; CI 1.11-1.31; p < 0.001) suggesting that, on average, the increase of 1 point in the sonographic score was associated with an increase of approximately 20% in the risk of death.ConclusionsOur results suggest the role of LUS in the identification of more congested HF patients, that will be at risk for worse long term outcome.

19 keywords...

hide…