Spatial Distribution of Hospitalisations for Cardiovascular Diseases in the Central Region of ​​Asturias, Spain

Abstract

BackgroundCardiovascular diseases are the leading cause of death worldwide; it is estimated that they cause 17 million deaths annually. In 2019, there were more than 29,000 deaths, and in 2018, ischemic heart diseases cause more than 118,000 hospitalisations in Spain. There is an unevenly distribution throughout the different autonomous communities, being Asturias the community with the highest rate for acute myocardial infarction (AMI) and angina pectoris (AP) of the country. Cardiovascular diseases are related to environmental, socioeconomic and previous medical conditions which result in geographical differences in the incidence of hospital admissions and mortality. To know the distribution of hospital admissions in the central area of Asturias and the existence of spatial patterns or clusters is the goal of this study.MethodsUrgent hospital admissions for AMI and angina AP in the hospitals of the central area of Asturias were registered, geocoded and grouped by census tracts. Standardised admission ratio, smoothed relative risk and posterior risk probability, together with analysis of spatial clusters between relative risks throughout the study area were calculated and mapped.ResultsGeographical differences were found in the distribution of hospital admissions for AMI and AP in the study area. The cluster analysis indicated aggregates of census tracts with high relative risk values in the northwest region of the study area.ConclusionThe geographical analysis shows the existence of patterns and spatial aggregations in the incidence of AMI and AP, for men and women, in the central area of Asturias.