Cardiovascular Events in Patients with Thyroid Storm.

Area of Science:

• Cardiology
• Endocrinology
• Internal Medicine

Background:

• Thyroid storm presents with diverse symptoms, primarily cardiovascular (CV) manifestations like arrhythmia, heart failure, and ischemia.
• The frequency and patient characteristics of these CV events during thyroid storm are not well-documented.

Purpose of the Study:

• To determine the frequency and characteristics of cardiovascular occurrences in patients hospitalized for thyroid storm.
• To analyze the impact of these events on patient outcomes.

Main Methods:

• Retrospective analysis of adult hospitalizations for thyroid storm from January 2012 to September 2015 using the National Inpatient Sample database.
• Identification of hospitalizations using International Classification of Diseases (ICD)-9 codes.
• Analysis performed using Statistical Analysis System (SAS).

Main Results:

• Out of 6380 hospitalizations, 3895 had cardiovascular events (CVEs).
• Arrhythmia (N=3770) was most frequent, followed by acute heart failure (N=555) and ischemic events (N=150).
• In-hospital mortality (3.5% vs 0.2%) and length of stay (4 vs 3 days) were significantly higher in patients with CVEs.

Conclusions:

• Cardiovascular events in thyroid storm hospitalizations significantly increase mortality, length of stay, and costs.
• Obesity, alcohol abuse, chronic liver disease, and COPD are associated with higher likelihood of CVEs.
• Ischemic events and acute heart failure correlate with increased mortality; further research on arrhythmias is needed.