Search

Purpose: To investigate the association of preexisting hypertension at admission with the mortality in patients with systolic heart failure (HF). Method: We prospectively investigated the association of preexisting hypertension with the mortality among 1351 patients with HF in Taiwan during an average 12 months (range: 8 months–18 months) follow-up period. A multivariate cox regression analysis for the overall cohort and a subgroup analysis by age were performed. Results: After adjustment for all potential risk factors, the associations of preexisting hypertension with cardiovascular mortality were significantly reduced in the overall cohort and those aged less than 65 years (hazard ratios (HR): 0.53, 95% confidence intervals (CI): 0.33–0.84, and 0.28, 95% CI: 0.11–0.67, respectively). However, the associations with all-cause mortality were not significantly different in these two groups (HR: 0.77, 95% CI: 0.54–1.09, and 0.59, 95% CI: 0.32–1.07, respectively). Furthermore, the associations were all nonsignificant in the patients aged older than 65 years. Conclusion: Preexisting hypertension have an inverse association with cardiovascular mortality in the Asian patients with systolic HF, particularly for those with younger ages. Keywords: Reverse epidemiology, Pre-existing hypertension, Heart failure

Objective: To investigate the 12-lead surface electrocardiographic (ECG) findings in young male patients with left primary spontaneous pneumothorax (PSP) estimated by the Collins equation. Methods: From 2003 through 2008, 60 young male patients who had left PSP and 61 age-matched unaffected males were included for 12-lead ECG analyses. The PSP size was estimated by the Collins equation. Those with left PSP were divided into two groups: 1) large PSP ≥30% (n = 37), and 2) small PSP