Prognostic Impact of Physician Specialty on the Prognosis of Outpatients With Heart Failure: Propensity Matched Analysis of the REDINSCOR and RICA Registries

Hospitalization outcome of heart diseases between patients who received medical care by cardiologists and non-cardiologist physicians: A propensity-score matched study

“…In addition, our study focused on short-term complications and mortality following admission due to cardiovascular diseases, excluding out-patient outcomes. In contrast, with previous reports [ 6 , 7 , 10 , 11 , 15 , 16 ], we believed that the short-term and admission outcomes may related to the type of physician service, thus underscoring the a cardiologist’s value. Finally, the validation of Taiwan’s National Health Insurance Research Database remains inadequate although the physician’s diagnosis and codes of diseases were validated in previous studies [ 41 – 46 ].…”

“…In addition, the type of ward is also related to a patient's health outcome. Patients admitted to the cardiovascular units at medical centers may benefit from more comprehensive care and a higher number of therapies [11,[33][34][35][36][37]. Patients also receive better nursing care focusing on cardiovascular complications, better medical attention by doctors and stay in a less complex medical care unit.…”

“…Fourth, we also did not normalize the use of medications, diagnosis procedures and treatment between both groups, which were usually compared in earlier references as the major results and causes. In contrast with other studies that were focused on only one cardiovascular disease [ 6 , 8 – 11 , 14 – 15 ], our analysis included nearly all common cardiovascular diseases along with many subtypes. In addition, our study focused on short-term complications and mortality following admission due to cardiovascular diseases, excluding out-patient outcomes.…”

“…While caring for patients with cardiovascular diseases, cardiologists are more likely to use clinical guideline-supported therapies or be more knowledgeable about therapies than general physicians, a fact which has been shown to reduce mortality [5]. Previous studies reported that patients treated by cardiologists may have a lower mortality or better outcome than general physicians [6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13]. However, other studies reported that there was no significant difference in the patients' outcomes between cardiologists and general physicians [14][15][16][17].…”

“…However, other studies reported that there was no significant difference in the patients' outcomes between cardiologists and general physicians [14][15][16][17]. The inconsistent findings from previous studies may be due to the presence of some limitations, such as small sample sizes [10], the lack of matching procedures [6][7][8][9][10][14][15][16], inadequate control for confounding factors [7,8,11], and a focus on specific cardiovascular diseases or populations [6][7][8][9][10][11][14][15][16].…”