Heart failure survival rates have barely improved in TWO decades: Condition that affects nearly 1m Brits will kill a fifth of all sufferers within a year
- The terminal condition currently affects more than 920,000 people in the UK
- Despite medical advances, deaths from heart failure hardly changed since 2000
- People diagnosed with heart failure have a 21 per cent chance of dying within a year, down from 26 per cent in 2000
Doctors have accused the Government of neglecting heart failure patients after a study found survival rates have barely improved in nearly 20 years.
The terminal condition – which is often mistaken for asthma or mere old age – currently affects more than 920,000 people in the UK.
But despite medical advances in treating many serious conditions, including cancer, experts at the universities of Oxford and Birmingham warned that the chances of dying from heart failure have hardly changed since 2000 as it ‘has not been a priority area in Government policy or funding’.
Doctors have accused the Government of neglecting heart failure patients after a study found survival rates have barely improved in nearly 20 years
After examining the data for 56,000 heart failure patients between 2000 and 2017, the researchers found only ‘gradual improvements’.
According to the most recent data, which was collected in 2016, people diagnosed with heart failure have a 21 per cent chance of dying within a year, down from 26 per cent in 2000.
The chance of dying within ten years dropped from 81 per cent in 2000 to 73 per cent in 2007.
Heart failure is a severe condition in which cardiac muscles become too weak to properly pump blood, leaving sufferers weak and out of breath.
The report’s authors, writing in the British Medical Journal, said: ‘Heart failure has not been a priority area in Government policy or funding, and other serious conditions, such as cancer, have seen a much greater improvement in survival over time.
‘The lack of substantial progress in improving heart failure survival rates should alert policy-makers to the need for further investment in heart failure services.’
A major report published last year called heart failure a ‘medical emergency’, with GPs missing two in three cases, significantly increasing the risk of early death.
Even when patients are diagnosed they are often left for months without follow-ups, and many are given drugs at the wrong dose.
Jeremy Pearson, associate medical director at the British Heart Foundation, said last night: ‘Heart failure is a cruel and debilitating illness affecting hundreds of thousands of people in the UK. But identifying shortfalls [in care] is the first step towards addressing them.’