Malnutrition is associated with poor prognosis in patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI). However, the prognostic impact of malnutrition in critical patients with AMI has not been well addressed.
We analyzed two critical AMI cohorts from Cardiorenal ImprovemeNt (CIN) in China and Medical Information Mark for Intensive Care-III (MIMIC-III) in the United States. The primary outcome was all-cause mortality. Cox proportional hazards models were constructed to examine the risk of malnutrition for mortality in critical patients with AMI.
There were 2,075 critical patients with AMI (mean age, 62.5 ± 12.3 years, 20.00% were female) from the CIN cohort and 887 critical patients with AMI (mean age, 70.1 ± 12.9 years, 37.43% were female) from MIMIC-III included in this study. Based on the Controlling Nutritional Status (CONUT) score, of the Chinese patients with AMI, the prevalence was 47.5, 28.3, and 3.5% for mild, moderate, and severe malnutrition, respectively. The percentage of mild, moderate, and severe malnutrition was 41.60, 30.55, and 7.32% in the MIMIC-III cohort, respectively. Controlling for confounders, worse nutritional state was significantly associated with increased risk for all-cause mortality [an adjusted hazard ratio for mild, moderate, and severe malnutrition, respectively, 1.10 (95% confidence interval (CI): 0.76–1.59), 1.49 (95% CI: 1.02–2.19), and 1.70 (95% CI: 1.00–2.88) in the CIN cohort and 1.41 (95% CI: 0.95–2.09), 1.97 (95% CI: 1.32–2.95), and 2.70 (95% CI: 1.67–4.37) in the MIMIC-III cohort].
Malnutrition was independently associated with an increased risk of all-cause mortality in critical patients with AMI after full adjustments. Further trials are needed to prospectively evaluate the efficacy of nutritional interventions in critical patients with AMI.