Symptomatic Pulmonary Embolism and the Risk of Recurrent Venous Thromboembolism

Abstract
Pulmonary embolism (PE) is a frequent and potentially fatal disease with an incidence of 1 in 1000 persons per year.1-3 Approximately 10% of the patients die of heart failure and cardiac shock within hours.4 Twenty-five percent of the patients do not survive the first year,5,6 but many deaths during this time are related to underlying conditions, such as cancer or chronic heart disease, rather than to recurrent PE.7,8 The prognosis of patients with PE without a predisposing illness might be more favorable, but the risk of recurrent venous thromboembolism (VTE) among these patients has never been investigated, to our knowledge.