INTRODUCTION
Lower socioeconomic status (SES) is associated with an increased incidence of heart failure (HF) (1, 2). Only one study has examined the relationship between SES and incident HF in primary care (3). Mortality (4-6), first hospitalizations (1, 3), HF hospitalizations (5-9), and readmissions (5, 6, 10) are higher in patients with low SES. Only one study has been performed in the community (4), and only one study defines risk separately in men and women (7). Previous studies have not adjusted for covariates like, education, dependency, total wealth, living status, marital status and occupational status, that are closely related to SES and prognosis. SES is a time-varying exposure, but no study so far has considered this in their analyses. Finally and most important, studies including objective measures of cardiac dysfunction have not been performed. Thus, the relationship between SES and the prognosis of HF with reduced (HFrEF) vs. preserved (HFpEF) ejection fraction remains uncertain.
To further analyze the association between SES and the prognosis of HF, HFrEF vs. HFpEF, we put forward the present prospective propensity matched study over 15 years on 9658 patients with incident HF.