Association of stroke and mortality among patients receiving heart transplantation-a nationwide study.

Abstract

This study aims to define the association of heart transplantation with incident stroke, cardiovascular (CV) and all-cause death. The incidence rate (IR) was calculated by dividing the number of outcomes by the summed person-years in the group during the follow-up period. Crude and adjusted hazard ratios (HRs) and the corresponding 95% confidence intervals (CIs) were estimated through univariable and multivariable Cox proportional hazards models. Propensity score (PS) matching analysis was adopted to minimize the differences between the two cohorts. Each cohort had 13,948 study participants. Compared to the control group, patients with heart transplantation had a higher risk of stroke (adjusted HR [95% CI] = 2.96 [2.72, 3.22]) and CV death (adjusted HR [95% CI] = 5.33 [4.87, 5.83]), and the risk is higher in the subgroup of the male sex, without comorbidity, and follow-up period < 10 years.  Among patients who underwent cardiac transplantation, the subgroups of the male sex, without comorbidities and short follow-up period are at higher risk for incident stroke and CV death.