In-hospital Mortality and Associated Factors among Adult Patients with Acute Heart Failure in a Tertiary Hospital, Harar, Eastern Ethiopia: A Cross-Sectional Study

Background : Acute heart failure is the gradual or rapid change of heart failure signs and symptoms, which poses a unique diagnostic and management challenge, requiring urgent therapy. It is responsible for nearly one million hospitalizations each year globally with rising rates. Despite therapeutic advances, it is associated with poor prognosis. Therefore, his study aimed to assess in-hospital mortality and its associated factors among adult acute heart failure patients in a tertiary hospital, Harar, Eastern Ethiopia. Methods : A hospital based retrospective cross-sectional study was employed among 454 adult acute heart failure patients treated in the medical ward of Haramaya University Hiwot Fana Comprehensive Specialized Hospital from June 01, 2016 to May 31, 2021. Data was collected using structured data abstraction format from July 15 to August 14, 2021. Collected data was entered to Epi-Data version 3.1, exported to, and analyzed using statistical package for social science (SPSS) version 21.0. Bivariate and multivariate logistic regression was used to identify factors associated with in-hospital mortality. Results : A total of 454 acute heart failure patient’s medical records were reviewed. More than half, 282(62.1%) of patients were females. The median age of patients was 45 years (±28 IQR). In-hospital mortality was 18.9% and it was more prevalent in the first week of admission, 61(70.9%). Sex (female) (adjusted odds ratio (AOR) = 2.83, P = 0.001)), having smoking history (AOR = 2.51, P = 0.031), generalized body swelling (AOR = 2.67, P = 0.001), hypotension (AOR = 4.56, P = 0.001), and tachycardia (AOR = 4.57, P = 0.000) were factors associated with in-hospital mortality. Conclusions : In-hospital mortality is found to be very high among acute heart failure adult patients. Therefore, dedicated programs need to be developed to reduce mortality from acute heart failure and further prospective study should be conducted to investigate the problem in-depth.