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Atrial Fibrillation: Mortality, Stroke, and Medical Costs
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| Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings. |
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In their recent study, Wolf et al1 reported that atrial fibrillation (AF) was associated with increased mortality, stroke, and medical costs. While we found their study to be interesting, 2 issues warrant comment.
First, there appears to be a discrepancy between the abstract and the body of the text. The abstract states that the adjusted total Medicare expenditures in 1 year were "8.6- to 22.6-fold greater in men, and 9.8- to 11.2-fold greater in women. . . . " However, both the text and Table 7 indicate that these numbers actually represent percentage increases rather than multiples of the baseline expenditure (8.6%-22.6% and 9.8%-11.2% increase in costs in men and women, respectively).
Second, we are concerned about the relationship between AF and major cardiac surgery. The absolute difference in costs between patients with AF and those without was highest for men aged 65 to 74 years, in which 18.9% of . . . [Full Text of this Article]
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