Current presentation and management of heart failure in cardiology and internal medicine hospital units: a tale of two worlds—the TEMISTOCLE study

Background The purpose pf the current article is to describe the clinical profile, use of resources, management and outcome in a population of real-world inpatients with heart failure. Methods and results With a prospective, cross-sectional survey on acute hospital admissions, we evaluated the overall and provider-related differences in patient characteristics, diagnostic work-up, treatment and inhospital outcome of 2127 patients with heart failure admitted to 167 cardiology departments and 250 internal medicine departments between February 14 and 25, 2000. Patients admitted to cardiology units were younger (56.3% >70 years vs 76.2%, P < .0001), had more severe symptoms (NYHA IV 35% vs 29%, P = .00014), and more often underwent evaluation of ventricular function (89.3% vs 54.8%, P < .0001) and coronary angiography (7.5% vs 0.9%, P < .0001) than those admitted to medical units. Moreover, they were more often prescribed β-blockers (17.8% vs 8.7%, P < .0001). However, prescription of angiotensin-converting enzyme inhibitors and angiotensin-receptor blockers (78.7% vs 81.5%, P = not significant [NS]) and inhospital mortality (5.2% vs 5.9%, P = NS) were similar. A 6-month follow-up visit was performed in 56.4% of cases (68.2% of cardiology vs 49.4% of medicine patients, P < .0001); 6-month readmission (43.7% vs 45.4%, P = NS) and mortality (13.9% vs 16.7%, P = NS) rates were similar. Conclusions Patients with heart failure admitted to cardiology and internal medicine units represent 2 clearly different populations. In both groups, diagnostic procedures and evidence-based treatments, such as β-blockers, appeared to be underused, and there was a lack of structured follow-up, as well as a poor 6-month prognosis.