A recent Mayo Clinic study has made a data-driven discovery for patients with heart failure in the intensive care unit.

Using machine learning, the researchers identified groups of patients with heart failure with higher and lower risk of mortality based on underlying patterns of laboratory values.

"The goal of this study was to explore different groups in the larger population of patients with heart failure admitted to the cardiac ICU," says Jacob Jentzer, M.D., a Kern Health Care Delivery Scholar and lead author of the study. "Recognising that a critically ill heart failure patient belongs to one of these groups can help clinicians understand their likely underlying disease process and prognosis, allowing individualised therapy with the goal of improving outcomes."

Through the analysis, Dr. Jentzer and his colleagues identified five distinct groups, including patients with evidence of iron deficiency, kidney dysfunction, inflammation and poor blood flow. Each group had unique characteristics and risk profiles. Researchers underscore that by identifying these distinct groups, clinicians can craft treatment plans for each patient's needs and help to enhance outcomes and overall quality of care.

The groups in the study included:

The findings revealed that the patients in the uncomplicated group generally had the best outcomes. In contrast, the patients in the inflamed, cardiorenal and iron-deficient groups all had an intermediate mortality risk.

Researchers note that patients in the hypoperfused group had the highest risk of mortality.

"The phenotypes and subgroups based on patterns of laboratory findings identified in this study have not been described before and could represent different noncardiac organ complications driven by different underlying biologic processes," says Dr. Jentzer. "This may help identify unique targeted therapies in a future study." 

Researchers underscore the influence of the Kern Health Care Delivery Scholars Program on researchers conducting studies such as this that impact the practice and seek to improve healthcare delivery. 

"The Kern Health Care Delivery Scholars program enables practising clinicians, such as Dr. Jentzer, to dedicate time to learning healthcare delivery methods so they can approach clinical challenges in a novel way," says Shannon Dunlay, M.D., a heart failure cardiologist and senior author of the study. "The findings from this study can be used to identify personalised treatment strategies for patients with heart failure in the cardiac ICU."

Review the study for a complete list of authors, disclosures and funding.