Prognostic Impact of Active Cigarette Smoking on Mortality in Patients with Acute Venous Thromboembolic Events, Findings from Real World Data

Background and Objectives: The influence of smoking habits on mortality, VTE recurrence, and major bleeding in patients receiving anticoagulant therapy for venous thromboembolism (VTE) has not been consistently evaluated. Materials and Methods: We used data from the RIETE (Registro Enfermedad TromboEmbólica) registry to compare mortality, VTE recurrence, and major bleeding risk in smoking versus non-smoking patients with acute VTE. Results: 50,881 patients (43,426 non-smoking and 7455 smoking patients) were included. After a median follow-up of 8.8 months, 7110 patients died (fatal PE 292 and fatal bleeding 281), 3243 presented VTE recurrence, and 1579 had major bleeding. At multivariate analysis, smoking behavior was associated with a higher hazard of death, (HR: 1.28; 95% CI: 1.19–1.40). The risk of VTE recurrence was marginally increased in smoking patients compared to non-smoking patients (1.14; 95% CI: 1.02–1.27). Major bleeding did not differ in smoking and non-smoking patients (1.15; 95% CI: 0.96–1.38). The presence of cancer did not appear to influence the association between smoking habits and death (HR: 1.34; 95% CI: 1.22–1.47 in cancer patients and HR: 1.23; 95% CI: 1.04, 1.45 in non-cancer patients, respectively) Conclusions: the risk of death after an acute episode of VTE appeared to be higher in smoking than in non-smoking patients and this risk is higher between patients presenting PE at the onset of symptoms.