AUTHOR=Lee Po-Tseng , Huang Ting-Chun , Huang Mu-Hsiang , Hsu Ling-Wei , Su Pei-Fang , Liu Yen-Wen , Hung Meng-Hsuan , Liu Ping-Yen 

TITLE=The Burden of Ventricular Premature Complex Is Associated With Cardiovascular Mortality

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Cardiovascular Medicine

VOLUME=8

YEAR=2022

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/cardiovascular-medicine/articles/10.3389/fcvm.2021.797976

DOI=10.3389/fcvm.2021.797976

ISSN=2297-055X

ABSTRACT=<sec><title>Background</title><p>Ventricular premature complex (VPC) is one of the most common ventricular arrhythmias. The presence of VPC is associated with an increased risk of heart failure (HF).</p></sec><sec><title>Method</title><p>We designed a single-center, retrospective, and large population-based cohort to clarify the role of VPC burden in long-term prognosis in Taiwan. We analyzed the database from the National Cheng Kung University Hospital-Electronic Medical Record (NCKUH-EMR) and NCKUH-Holter (NCKUH-Holter). A total of 19,527 patients who underwent 24-h Holter ECG monitoring due to palpitation, syncope, and clinical suspicion of arrhythmias were enrolled in this study.</p></sec><sec><title>Results</title><p>The clinical outcome of interests involved 5.65% noncardiovascular death and 1.53% cardiovascular-specific deaths between 2011 and 2018. Multivariate Cox regression analysis, Fine and Gray's competing risk model, and propensity score matching demonstrated that both moderate (1,000–10,000/day) and high (&gt;10,000/day) VPC burdens contributed to cardiovascular death in comparison with a low VPC burden (&lt;1,000/day).</p></sec><sec><title>Conclusion</title><p>A higher VPC burden <italic>via</italic> Holter ECG is an independent risk factor of cardiovascular mortality.</p></sec>