Table 5

Characteristics of patients enrolled, end points, and annual mortality rates in the large β blocker trials in CHF

	USCP	CIBIS II	MERIT-HF
Number of patients	1094	2647	3991
Mean age (years)	58	61	64
Male sex (%)	77	81	78
Mean LVEF (%)	23	28	28
Ischaemic heart disease^7-150	47	50	65
NYHA class (%)
II	53	0	41
III	44	83	56
IV	3	17	3.6
Mean systolic BP (mm Hg)	115	130	130
Mean diastolic BP (mm Hg)	73	80	78
Mean heart rate (beats/min)	83	81	82
Atrial fibrillation	–	20	17
Diabetes mellitus	–	–	25
Hypertension	–	–	44
Primary end point	Various	Mortality	Mortality
Total number of deaths	54	384	362
Annual mortality rate^7-151
Placebo	N/A^7-152	13.2	11.0
β blocker	N/A	8.8	7.2
Mean follow up^7-153	6.5 months	1.3 years	1 years

↵7-150 Strict criteria were used to diagnose ischaemic heart disease in CIBIS II;
↵7-151 estimated annual mortality rate in CIBIS-II and mortality rate per patient year in MERIT-HF;
↵7-152 median follow up only 6.5 months;
↵7-153 median in case of USCP.