Résumé
Acute pericarditis is rather frequent. Annual incidence is estimated to 27.7 new cases per 100,000 inhabitants in Europe. About 5% of all non-ischemic chest pains admitted at emergencies could be pericarditis. Most of the patients are young patients, with a significant cost to society, particularly as regards hospitalizations. Indeed, pericarditis represents 1% of all hospitalizations in department of cardiology. It could be very interesting if clinical presentation and especially heart rate could help predict duration of hospitalizations.
Between March 2007 and February 2010, we conducted a retrospective study concerning all patients admitted in our center for acute pericarditis. Diagnosis criteria included 2 among the 4 following: typical chest pain, friction rub, pericardial effusion on echocardiography, or typical ECG findings. We evaluated hospital events (heart failure, acute pains, death) and biology during hospitalization (CRP on admission, on days 1, 2, 3, and especially peak).
At one month, clinical events were recorded through phone calls when not noticed in clinical settings.
We included 73 patients. Mean age was 41.0 y (CI 95% 37.2-44.8) and mean hospitalization duration was 3.5 d (2.5-4.5). Heart rate on admission was 88 bpm (83.6-92.4) and 71.8 bpm (68.9-74.7) on discharge. CRP peak was strongly correlated with heart rate (r=0.54; p<0.0001) and with hospitalization duration (r=0.8; p=0.007). Finally, we found a positive correlation between heart rate on admission and duration of hospitalizations (r=0,226; p<0.06). Fever was scarcely observed (21%), and was not correlated with heart rate and with CRP.
In acute pericarditis, cardiac frequency at admission is correlated with hospitalization duration, and could be a new prognostic marker. This point deserves to be explored, in order to reduce hospitalization duration. [Display omitted]