MEESSIMEESSI-AHF Scale Impact on Acute Heart Failure Patient Prognosis and Decision Making

This study focuses on evaluating the impact of the MEESSI-AHF scale, a tool designed to assess the risk in patients diagnosed with Acute Heart Failure (AHF) in emergency departments. The study involves over 8,000 patients across 16 Spanish emergency departments. The main goal is to understand how using this scale can influence decision-making and the overall prognosis of AHF patients. This research is crucial as it could potentially improve the care and outcomes for patients with Acute Heart Failure. The study consists of three parts. In the first part, patients receive usual care and their risk is retrospectively stratified using the MEESSI-AHF scale. The second part involves a quasi-experimental approach where some patients receive usual care, while others have their risk assessed using the MEESSI-AHF scale before a decision is made. The third part is a randomized clinical trial where patients are either managed with usual care or with the use of the MEESSI-AHF scale. The primary outcomes measured include death from any cause and cardiovascular cause at 30 days and 1 year, combined events (revisit to the ED or hospitalization for AHF or death) at 30 days post-discharge, days alive and outside the hospital at 30 days after the initial ED visit, and the proportion of patients managed without hospitalization.