Background

Heart failure (HF) necessitates frequent transport by emergency medical services (EMS), but few studies have been conducted to evaluate predictors of EMS use and of multiple EMS transports that are amenable to intervention.

Objectives

To characterize prehospital clinical status of community-dwelling adults with reported HF who used EMS across 8 years and to evaluate predictors of EMS use and multiple EMS transports.

Methods

Data were from a database in a large Midwestern county. Descriptive statistics, logistic and negative binomial regression were used for analysis.

Results

EMS transports were evaluated for 6582 adults with 16,905 transports. The most common chief complaints were respiratory problems, feeling sick, and chest pain. Shortness of breath, chest pain, level of consciousness, age, gender, race, and hospital site predicted multiple transports.

Conclusions

Clinicians need to educate patients with HF about ways to manage shortness of breath and chest pain and when to activate EMS.