Heart failure and left ventricular remodeling after reperfused acute myocardial infarction in patients with hypertension.

In the thrombolytic era, hypertension has been shown to adversely affect the development of heart failure after acute myocardial infarction (AMI). We sought to examine the relation between antecedent hypertension and heart failure after mechanical reperfusion and to test the impact of postinfarction left ventricular remodeling on heart failure in hypertensive patients. A series of 953 patients (324 hypertensives) with AMI treated with successful primary percutaneous coronary intervention underwent a 5-year follow-up. A subgroup of 325 subjects underwent 2D echocardiography at admission, 1 month, and 6 months. From day 1 to 6 months, despite similar improvement in regional and global left ventricular function and similar 6-month infarct artery patency rate, left ventricular end-diastolic volume increased in the normotensives (122+/-36 mL to 131+/-47 mL; P<0.001) but not in the hypertensives (127+/-41 mL to 128+/-31 mL; P=0.768). At 6 months, the incidence of left ventricular remodeling in hypertensive and normotensive patients was not different (22% versus 28%; P=0.210). However, at 5 years, the incidences of hospitalization for heart failure (7% versus 3%; P=0.014) and of New York Heart Association functional class > or =2 (53% versus 40%; P<0.001) were higher in hypertensive as compared with normotensive patients. Hypertension was found to be a predictor of heart failure (hazard ratio, 2.23; P=0.015). In conclusion, patients with antecedent hypertension are at higher risk to develop heart failure after AMI, even when successfully reperfused by primary percutaneous coronary intervention. However, the increased incidence of heart failure in hypertensive patients is not associated with a greater propensity to postinfarction left ventricular remodeling.