Mortality and hospitalizations in heart failure show a seasonal variation

A retrospective analysis of 324,013 hospitalizations and 138,602 deaths during a four-year period in France shows that there is a seasonal variation in hospitalizations and death from heart failure, which peak during the winter months; the distribution of monthly events differed by 35 percent when January, the month with the highest number of events, was compared to August during which the event rate was the lowest (p<0.001).