During 2002-2014, hypertensive crisis hospitalizations increased steadily, but the odds of death during such hospitalizations decreased, according to a study published in the Journal of the American Heart Association. Joseph E. Ebinger, MD, and colleagues estimated the sex-pooled and sex-specific temporal trends in hypertensive crisis hospitalization and case fatality rates from 2002-2006, 2007- 2011, and 2012-2014. The researchers identified an estimated 918,392 hypertensive crisis hospitalizations and 4,377 in-hospital deaths from 2002- 2014. During the entire period, hypertensive crisis accounted for 0.23% of all hospitalizations, including 0.24% for men and 0.22% for women. The odds of experiencing a hospitalization primarily for hypertensive crisis increased annually for both men and women in multivariable analyses adjusting for age, race or ethnicity, and cardiovascular conditions (ORs, 1.083 and 1.07 per year, respectively), with the rate of increase significantly higher for men. After multivariable adjustment, the odds of death during hypertensive crisis hospitalization decreased annually for men and women (ORs, 0.89 and 0.92 per year, respectively).
