Publications by authors named "Yuka Akama"
Background: Renal dysfunction is significantly associated with poor prognosis in patients with heart failure. However, the prognostic significance of proteinuria as a potential marker of an impaired glomerular filtration barrier in acute heart failure (AHF) remains unclear. We aimed to investigate the prognostic value of urinary protein/creatinine ratio (PCR) in patients with AHF.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground And Aims: In patients with heart failure (HF), differences in the association between estimated protein intake (PI) and prognosis in those with and without chronic kidney disease (CKD) remain to be clarified. This study aimed to investigate whether the prognostic effects of the estimated PI differ between patients with HF with and without CKD.
Methods: We included patients who required hospitalisation owing to worsening HF between 2015 and 2019 and assessed the estimated PI based on the adjusted Maroni formula using the body mass index and urinary urea nitrogen level.
Validation of Left Ventricular Filling Pressure Evaluation by Order of Tricuspid and Mitral Valve Opening in Patients With Atrial Fibrillation.
Circ Cardiovasc Imaging
November 2024
Article Synopsis
- Accurate assessment of left ventricular filling pressure in patients with atrial fibrillation is challenging, but a new scoring system called VMT score can visually assess valve opening timings to evaluate this pressure.
- In a study with 119 patients, the VMT score showed a strong correlation with elevated pulmonary arterial wedge pressure and had a diagnostic accuracy of 87%, outperforming traditional Doppler methods.
- The findings were validated in a separate group of 189 patients, confirming that a VMT score of 2 or higher indicates significant left ventricular filling pressure elevation, making it a potentially valuable tool in clinical settings.
Background: Current guidelines recommend placing an implantable cardiac defibrillator for patients with cardiac sarcoidosis and a severely impaired left ventricular ejection fraction (LVEF) of ≤35%. In this study, we determined the association between mild or moderate LVEF impairment and fatal ventricular arrhythmic event (FVAE).
Methods And Results: We retrospectively analyzed 401 patients with cardiac sarcoidosis without sustained ventricular arrhythmia at diagnosis.
Prevalence and prognostic value of atrial fibrillation in patients with cardiac sarcoidosis.
Eur Heart J Open
September 2023
Article Synopsis
- This study investigates how the presence of atrial fibrillation (AF) at the time of cardiac sarcoidosis (CS) diagnosis affects patient outcomes.
- A post-hoc analysis was conducted on data from 445 patients, revealing that those with AF had worse prognoses, indicated by higher levels of brain natriuretic peptide and increased hospitalizations due to heart failure.
- The findings suggest that having AF during CS diagnosis significantly raises the risk of all-cause death and heart failure hospitalization over a median follow-up period of 3.2 years.
Prognostic value of estimating appendicular muscle mass in heart failure using creatinine/cystatin C.
Nutr Metab Cardiovasc Dis
September 2023
Article Synopsis
- The study investigates the prognosis of heart failure patients with low appendicular skeletal muscle mass index (ASMI), comparing two methods: an anthropometric model and a biomarker model that includes serum creatinine-to-cystatin C ratio.
- Out of 847 patients, significant differences were noted in how many were diagnosed with low ASMI using these models, highlighting poor agreement between the two methods.
- The results indicate that the biomarker model's prediction of low ASMI is significantly linked to increased risk of all-cause mortality, while the anthropometric model does not show the same predictive power.
Clinical and prognostic implications of hyaluronic acid in hospitalized patients with heart failure.
Heart Vessels
September 2023
Article Synopsis
- The study examined the role of hyaluronic acid levels as a marker for liver fibrosis in hospitalized heart failure patients, involving 655 participants from 2015 to 2019.
- Patients were categorized into three groups based on hyaluronic acid levels, with higher levels correlating to worse heart function indicators and an increased rate of all-cause death.
- The findings highlighted that elevated hyaluronic acid levels independently predicted worse outcomes, regardless of left ventricular function, providing additional prognostic insight beyond existing factors like the fibrosis-4 index.