Characterization of patients with pulmonary thromboembolism

Abstract

Introduction: Pulmonary embolism (PE), is acommon complication in clinical practice. Mortality is between 13 % and 58%, according to severity.Because of that, it is very important to know the epidemiologic and clinic characteristics of patients in our city.

Methods: This was a retrospective descriptive study on patients admitted at the Santa Maria Cardiovascular Clinic of Medellín, between 1994 and 2004.

Results: We found 94 charts with confirmed diagnosis of PE, 51% belonged to inpatients. The main risk factors found, were deep venous thrombosis (DVT), being bedridden, heart failure and patients with prior venous embolismo The main clinical sign and symptoms found were dyspnea, chest pain, cough and a high frequency of syncope. 11% of patients had Massive PE and 24% had Sub- massive PE. The most common electrocardiography abnormalities were: Sinus tachycardia, inverted T wave and S1Q3T3. The lethality was 8.51% and the hospitalization mean time was 9 days.

Conclusions: This series allows to know epidemiologic and clinic characteristics and diagnostics tests for patients from this region with PE as a diagnosis. This is also the opportunity to find our patient's risk factors trough new researches.