Valve regurgitation in patients surviving endocarditis and the subsequent risk of heart failure

Significant valve regurgitation is common in patients surviving native valve infective endocarditis (IE), however the associated risk of heart failure (HF) subsequent to hospital discharge after IE is sparsely described.

We linked data from the East Danish Endocarditis Registry with administrative registries from 2002 to 2016 and included patients treated medically for IE who were discharged alive. Left-sided valve regurgitation was assessed by echocardiography at IE discharge and examined for longitudinal risk of HF. Multivariable adjusted Cox analysis was used to assess the associated risk of HF in patients with regurgitation (moderate or severe) compared with patients without regurgitation.

We included 192 patients, 87 patients with regurgitation at discharge (30 with aortic regurgitation and 57 with mitral regurgitation) and 105 patients without. The cumulative risk of HF at 5 years of follow-up was 28.7% in patients with regurgitation at IE discharge and 12.4% in patients without regurgitation; the corresponding multivariable adjusted HR was 3.53 (95% CI 1.72 to 7.25). We identified an increased associated risk of HF for patients with aortic regurgitation (HR=2.91, 95% CI 1.14 to 7.43) and mitral regurgitation (HR=3.95, 95% CI 1.80 to 8.67) compared with patients without regurgitation. During follow-up, 21.9% and 5.7% underwent left-sided valve surgery among patients with and without regurgitation.

In patients surviving IE, treated medically, we observed that severe or moderate left-sided native valve regurgitation was associated with a significantly higher risk of HF compared with patients without regurgitation at IE discharge. Close monitoring of these patients is needed to initiate surgery timely.