Clinical Utility and Validation of the Krakow DCM Risk Score-A Prognostic Model Dedicated to Dilated Cardiomyopathy.

BACKGROUND

One of the most common causes of heart failure is dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM). In DCM, the mortality risk is high and reaches approximately 20% in 5 years. A patient's prognosis should be established for appropriate HF management. However, so far, no validated tools have been available for the DCM population.

METHODS

The study population consisted of 735 DCM patients: 406 from the derivation cohort (previously described) and 329 from the validation cohort (from 2009 to 2020, with outcome data after a mean of 42 months). For each DCM patient, the individual mortality risk was calculated based on the Krakow DCM Risk Score.

RESULTS

During follow-up, 49 (15%) patients of the validation cohort died. They had shown significantly higher calculated 1-to-5-year mortality risks. The Krakow DCM Risk Score yielded good discrimination in terms of overall mortality risk, with an AUC of 0.704-0.765. Based on a 2-year mortality risk, patients were divided into non-high (≤6%) and high (>6%) mortality risk groups. The observed mortality rates were 8.3% (n = 44) vs. 42.6% (n = 75), respectively (HR 3.37; 95%CI 1.88-6.05; p < 0.0001).

CONCLUSIONS

The Krakow DCM Risk Score was found to have good predictive accuracy. The 2-year mortality risk > 6% has good discrimination for the identification of high-risk patients and can be applied in everyday practice.