Pain and Heart Failure During Transport by Emergency Medical Services and Its Associated Outcomes: Hospitalization, Mortality, and Length of Stay

Background: Over 22% of patients with heart failure (HF) are transported by emergency medical services (EMSs) for a primary complaint of pain. The relationship between a primary complaint of pain on hospitalization status, mortality, or length of stay following transport by EMS is understudied.Objectives: The objective of this study was to determine whether a primary complaint of pain during EMS transport predicted hospitalization status, mortality, or inpatient length of stay.Methods: In this retrospective longitudinal cohort study, data were analyzed from electronic health records of 3539 patients with HF. Descriptive statistics and multivariate logistic and linear regression analyses were used to achieve study objectives.Results: Demographics were mean age 64.83 years (standard deviation [SD] = 14.58); gender 57.3% women, 42.7% men; self-reported race 56.2% black, 43.2% white, and 0.7% other. Of 3539 patients, 2346 (66.3%) were hospitalized, 149 (4.2%) died, and the mean length of stay was 6.02 (SD = 7.55) days. A primary complaint of pain did not predict increased odds of in-hospital mortality but did predict 39% lower odds of hospitalization (p < .001), and 26.7% shorter length of stay (p < .001). Chest pain predicted 49% lower odds of hospitalization (p < .001) and 34.1% (p < .001) shorter length of stay, whereas generalized pain predicted 45% lower odds of hospitalization (p = .044) following post-hoc analysis.Conclusions: A primary complaint of chest pain predicted lower odds of hospitalization and shorter length of stay, possibly due to established treatment regimens. Additional research is needed to examine chronic pain rather than a primary complaint of pain.