Sex Differences in Achieving Guideline-recommended Heart Rate Control among a Large Sample of Patients at Risk for Sudden Cardiac Arrest

Background Despite known clinical benefits, guideline-recommended HR control is not achieved for a significant proportion of patients with HF and reduced ejection fraction. The Wearable Cardioverter Defibrillator (WCD) provides continuous heart rate (HR) monitoring and alerts that could aid medication titration. Objective This study sought to evaluate sex differences in achieving guideline-recommended HR control during a period of WCD use. Methods Data from patients fitted with a WCD from 2015 to 2018 were obtained from the manufacturer´s database (ZOLL, Pittsburgh, PA). The proportion of patients with adequate nighttime resting HR control at the beginning of WCD use (BOU) and at the end of WCD use (EOU) were compared by sex. Adequate HR control was defined as having a nighttime median HR <70 bpm. Results A total of 21,440 women and a comparative sample of 17,328 men (median 90 days of WCD wear, IQR 59-116) were included in the final dataset. Among patients who did not receive a shock, over half had insufficient HR control at BOU (59% of women, 53% of men). Although the proportion of patients with resting HR ≥70 improved by EOU, 43% of women and 36% of men did not achieve guideline-recommended HR control. Conclusions A significant proportion of women and men did not achieve adequate HR control during a period of medical therapy optimization. Compared to men, a greater proportion of women receiving WCD shocks had insufficiently controlled HR in the week preceding VT/VF and 43% of non-shocked women, compared to 36% of men, did not reach adequate HR control during the study period. The WCD can be utilized as a remote monitoring tool to record HR and inform adequate up-titration of BB, with particular focus on reducing the treatment gap in women.