Documented Valvular Regurgitation and Explicit Heart Failure in an Internal Medicine Registry: A Cross-Sectional Study

Background and Objectives: Routine records may conflate valvular heart disease (VHD), functional classification, and shared diagnostic assessment. We quantified the cross-sectional association between a registry VHD label and explicitly documented heart failure (HF), while recognizing that every observed valve lesion was regurgitant. Materials and Methods: The analytic sample comprised all 224 eligible adults admitted to the Internal Medicine II Department of a railway-affiliated hospital between 1 August 2025 and 31 July 2026: 38 with documented VHD and 186 without documented VHD. The primary outcome was an explicit HF diagnosis; a combined HF/NYHA-positive field was examined as an over-inclusive sensitivity outcome. Logistic regression was adjusted for age, sex, body mass index, smoking history, and total cholesterol. Results: Explicit HF was documented in 24/38 patients with VHD (63.2%) and 72/186 without VHD (38.7%; adjusted OR 2.87, 95% CI 1.38–5.99). The combined outcome was present in 28/38 (73.7%) and 101/186 (54.3%), respectively (adjusted OR 2.38, 95% CI 1.09–5.21). All 38 exposed patients had documented mitral, aortic, and/or tricuspid regurgitation; no stenosis, prolapse, or prior valve intervention was recorded. Conclusions: Documented valvular regurgitation was associated with explicit HF documentation. Because regurgitation may be secondary to ventricular or atrial disease, reverse causation, shared ascertainment, non-adjudicated diagnoses, and residual confounding preclude causal, temporal, prognostic, or lesion-specific inference.