The prognostic impact of diastolic dysfunction in patients with chronic heart failure and post-acute myocardial infarction: Can age-stratified E/A ratio alone predict survival?

OBJECTIVE: To determine the prognostic implications of diastolic filling grades and identify whether age-stratified E/A ratio alone can identify patients at high risk of death post-AMI and HF. We hypothesized that in response to ageing and pathology, a normal E/A (>1) could be considered abnormal in patients post-AMI older than 65years, and that in patients with symptomatic HF, a normal E/A always represents advanced diastolic dysfunction. METHODS AND RESULTS: This is a sub-analysis of the Meta-analysis Research Group in Echocardiography (MeRGE) which combined individual patient data from 30 prospective studies and demonstrated that restrictive filling was an important and independent predictor of all-cause mortality. This sub-analysis is restricted to those studies in which continuous E/A data were available (20 studies) and includes a total of 3082 AMI and 2321 HF patients. Patients were classified at the time of echocardiography into four filling patterns: normal, abnormal relaxation, pseudonormal, and restrictive filling. Post-AMI patients were divided into four groups on the basis of age and E/A, while patients with HF were classified into three groups, based on only E/A. Mortality across groups was compared using Kaplan-Meier survival analysis and Cox proportional hazards. In multivariable analyses in the AMI patients, age-stratified E/A was an independent predictor of outcome (HR 1.43 (95% CI: 1.31-1.56)), and in the HF cohort, E/A was confirmed as an independent predictor of mortality (HR 1.12 (95% CI 1.09-1.16)) alongside age and ejection fraction. CONCLUSIONS: Age-stratified E/A is an independent predictor of mortality after AMI and in HF patients, regardless of left ventricular ejection fraction, age and gender. E/A ratio could be a first step echocardiographic risk stratification, which could precede and indicate the need for more advanced diagnostic and prognostic considerations in high-risk AMI and HF patients.