fig1

Figure 1. Flow diagram illustrating the selection of patients included in the entire cohort. * The primary composite endpoint included cardiovascular death, heart transplantation, chronic heart failure {defined as left ventricular ejection fraction < 50% with New York Heart Association [NYHA] class ≥ II}, and structural cardiac abnormalities (left ventricular end-diastolic diameter > 5.5 cm or left atrial diameter > 4 cm for males; > 5.0 cm or > 3.5 cm for females, respectively). A total of 30 patients were included in the category “Having other diseases may affect the primary outcome”. The sum of the subcategories is 31 because one patient suffered from both chronic heart failure and coronary artery disease.