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The Adequacy of Laboratory Monitoring in Patients Treated With Spironolactone for Congestive Heart Failure

Keyur B. Shah, MD^_*, Krishnamurti Rao, BS, Robert Sawyer, MD and Stephen S. Gottlieb, MD, FACC^,_*

^_* Department of Medicine
Division of Cardiology
Department of Otorhinolaryngology-Head and Neck Surgery
Division of Cardiology, The University of Maryland School of Medicine and the Baltimore Veterans Affairs Medical Center, Baltimore, Maryland

View larger version (28K): [in a new window]   Figure 1 The laboratory monitoring follow-up of patients with heart failure started with spironolactone. One-third of the patients did not have serum potassium checked within three months of drug initiation.

View larger version (27K): [in a new window]   Figure 2 The incidence of hyperkalemia associated with various baseline serum creatinine concentrations. Note that even a modest increase in creatinine concentration increases the risk of hyperkalemia.