Temporal trends in mortality, heart failure hospitalization, and stroke in heart failure patients with and without atrial fibrillation: a nationwide study from 1997 to 2018 on 152 059 patients

AIMS: We aimed to investigate temporal trends in all-cause mortality, heart failure (HF) hospitalization, and stroke from 1997 to 2018 in patients diagnosed with both HF and atrial fibrillation (AF).

METHODS AND RESULTS: From Danish nationwide registers, we identified 152 059 patients with new-onset HF between 1997 and 2018. Patients were grouped according to year of new-onset HF and AF-status: Prevalent AF (n = 34 734), New-onset AF (n = 12 691), and No AF (n = 104 634). Median age decreased from 76 to 73 years between 1997 and 2018. The proportion of patients with prevalent or new-onset AF increased from 24.7% (n = 9256) to 35.8% (n = 14 970). Five-year risk of all-cause mortality went from 69.1% [confidence interval (CI): 67.9-70.2%] to 51.3% (CI: 49.9-52.7%), 62.3% (CI: 60.5-64.4%) to 43.0% (CI: 40.5-45.5%), and 61.9% (CI: 61.3-62.4%) to 36.7% (CI: 35.9-37.6%) for the Prevalent AF, New-onset AF, and No AF-group, respectively. Minimal changes were observed in the risk of HF-hospitalization. Five-year stroke risk decreased from 8.5% (CI: 7.8-9.1%) to 5.0% (CI: 4.4-5.5%) for the prevalent AF group, 8.2% (CI: 7.2-9.2%) to 4.6% (CI: 3.7-5.5%) for new-onset AF, and 6.3% (CI: 6.1-6.6%) to 4.9% (CI: 4.6-5.3%) for the No AF group. Simultaneously, anticoagulant therapy increased for patients with prevalent (from 42.7 to 93.1%) and new-onset AF (from 41.9 to 92.5%).

CONCLUSION: From 1997 to 2018, we observed an increase in patients with HF and co-existing AF. Mortality decreased for all patients, regardless of AF-status. Anticoagulation therapy increased, and stroke risk for patients with AF was reduced to a similar level as patients without AF in 2013-2018.