Heart Failure Mortality during COVID-19 Pandemic: Insights from a Cohort of Public Hospitals in Brazil

Introduction

Brazil is one of the most hit countries by the pandemic caused by the novel coronavirus (Coronavirus Disease, COVID-19), with more than half million deaths in June, 2021, the world’s second-highest number of deaths. It has been reported that the COVID-19 outbreak has affected the delivery of care of patients without COVID-19 (non-COVID-19 patients), particularly patients with cardiovascular (CV) diseases, increasing the death toll from the pandemic. Studies have shown a reduction in hospitalizations in tandem with an increase mortality from CV diseases during the outbreak in many countries. ^– However, most of these reports focused on patients with acute coronary syndrome (ACS ) in developed countries, with few data on heart failure (HF) admissions, and the reasons for the worse mortality are not well understood. We evaluated the changes in severity, reasons for decompensation and 30-day mortality of patients admitted for HF in public hospitals included in the Best Practices in Cardiology (BPC) program in Brazil during the COVID-19 outbreak and compared with previous periods.

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