2Dicle University, Faculty of Medicine, Department of Chest Diseases, DÄ°YARBAKIR Introduction: The ratio of elderly people in Turkey is rapidly growing. It is known that pulmonary embolism and venous thrombolysis incidence increases with age. Despite the major advances in pulmonary embolism diagnosis and treatment, pulmonary embolism leads to higher mortality rates in the elderly. In the present study, evaluation of socio-demographic and clinical characteristics of elderly patients diagnosed with pulmonary embolism in the emergency department and determination of factors that affect early mortality have been targeted in order to decrease mortality.
Materials and Method: Between January 1, 2009, and September 30, 2014, patients who were 65 years of age and older who had been admitted through the emergency department with suspected pulmonary embolism and whose pulmonary embolism diagnosis was finalized via computerized tomographic pulmonary angiography.
Results: In the study, 87 (61.8%) were female and 52 (38.2%) were male. Thirteen patients (9.4%) died during the follow-up period. The analysis of the relationship between pulmonary embolism in elderly patients and early mortality revealed that there is a statistical correlation among immobility, syncope, tachycardia, hypotension, elevated Troponin-T, coronary arterial disease, cerebrovascular disease, pulmonary embolism with massive dimension, bilateral pulmonary embolism, Wells-likely pulmonary embolism, and modified Geneva-likely pulmonary embolism were statistically related factors(p values, respectively, were 0.002; 0.033; 0.000; 0.000; 0.000; 0.037; 0.011; 0.000; 0.030; 0.023; 0.018).
Conclusion: Immobility, syncope, tachycardia, hypotension, elevated Troponin T, coronary arterial disease, cerebrovascular disease, pulmonary embolism with massive dimension, bilateral pulmonary embolism, Wells-likely pulmonary embolism, and modified Geneva-likely pulmonary embolism were determined as effective risk factors affecting the early mortality of elderly patients with pulmonary embolism.
Keywords : Aged; Mortality; Pulmonary Embolism