Heart Failure Care Better, but Hospitalizations Up

January 11th, 2017

More than 5 million Americans are living with heart failure, and close to 500,000 patients are newly diagnosed each year. The good news for people with congestive heart failure is that survival rates have improved and the length of hospital stays has decreased, according to new research from experts at the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine and UPMC Heart and Vascular Institute.

“There has been significant progress in heart failure management over the past two decades, but more has to be done,” said Muhammad Bilal Munir, MD, clinical instructor in medicine in Pitt’s School of Medicine and one of the study’s authors. “The number of hospitalizations has increased, identifying a need to implement heart failure quality measures stringently to reduce these admissions, therefore reducing heart failure-associated health care costs.”