The incidence of opioid-associated cardiac arrest increased significantly in 2012-2018, according to a study presented at the virtual European Society of Cardiology Congress 2021. Investigators who examined and compared contemporary trends of cardiac arrest in patients with and without opioid abuse found that 3.1% of the 1,410,475 cardiac arrest hospitalizations that met inclusion criteria had cardiac arrest plus a secondary diagnosis of opioid use. In-hospital mortality rates were 56.7% and 61.2% for patients with and without opioid use, respectively. Compared with cardiac arrest without opioid use, hospitalizations for cardiac arrest with opioid use were associated with a higher prevalence of alcohol use (16.9% vs 7.1%), depression (18.8% vs 9.0%), and smoking (37.0% vs 21.8%). Patients with heart failure, diabetes mellitus, hypertension, and renal failure were less likely to have hospitalizations for cardiac arrest with opioid use.
