Objective:
To understand the burden of cardiovascular diseases (CVDs) in a psychiatric outpatient population.
Methods:
We used baseline data from the ongoing Penn State Psychiatry Clinical Assessment and Rating Evaluation System (PCARES) Registry, which is comprised of adult patients who were seen at a psychiatric outpatient clinic affiliated with the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Health and the Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center. The Electronic Medical Record (EMR) data from 3,024 patients who sought psychiatric care between 02/17/2015 and 09/18/2019 were included in this report. We compared the prevalence of CVDs and the mean levels of major CVD risk factors in our sample with that reported in the 2013-2016 National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES).
Results:
The mean age of the study population was 42.7 (16.7) years, with 63% female and 85% Caucasians. The most common psychiatric diagnoses at baseline were Major Depressive Disorder [ICD-10: F32 & F33] (45%), Generalized Anxiety Disorder [ICD-10: F41.1] (20%), and Bipolar Disorder [ICD-10: F31] (12%). Eighteen percent of patients reported using tobacco products and 1.7% reported using alcohol. The prevalence (%) of CVDs, type 2 diabetes, hypertension, and dyslipidemia in our sample were 9.1, 20, 48, and 41%, respectively (all significantly higher than the NHANES reports, all p < 0.0001). The baseline means (mg/dl) of total cholesterol (C), LDL-C, HDL-C, and triglycerides (TG) were 186, 108, 48, and 156, respectively (all are significantly lower than that reported from the NHANES, except for TG, which was higher than that of the NHANES, all p < 0.0001), while 22% of all patients had prescriptions for lipid-lowering medications. Baseline mean level of glucose and HbA1C were 111 mg/dl and 6.2% (both significantly higher than that from the NHANES, p < 0.0001).
Conclusions:
In this systematic registry of psychiatric outpatients from a mid-Atlantic academic medical center, the baseline CVD burden as measured by common cardiovascular diseases, comorbidities and risk factors are significantly higher than the CVD burden in the general US population. Considering that the mean age of this patient population is 5 years younger than that of the NHANES population, our data underscores the need for control and prevention of CVD in patients with psychiatric conditions, and suggests the potential of integrating mental and physical health care in this type of special population.
Improving the precision of depression diagnosis in general practice: a cluster-randomized trial
