Nearly half of Australian adults who survive incident hospitalisation for AF will have an unplanned readmission within two years, half of which will be cardiovascular-related, Perth researchers say.

Results from their retrospective cohort study also suggest patients with one or more unplanned readmissions have a three- to sixfold higher risk of death compared to those without such episodes.

The authors, from the University of Western Australia, say the findings underscore the importance of AF-targeted treatments such as AF ablation in reducing the associated mortality and morbidity burden.

“Our study extends previous investigations of long-term hospitalisation risk in patients with AF but is unique in that we considered unplanned readmissions only in the primary outcome, as this more so reflects quality of care,” they wrote.