Performance of the FORD Versus Other Available Models for the Noninvasive Prediction of Pulmonary Hypertension in Patients with Interstitial Lung Disease.

Purpose: Pulmonary hypertension (PH) is associated with morbidity and mortality in patients with interstitial lung disease (ILD). Several prediction models have been proposed to predict PH in ILD patients. We sought to discern how previously described prediction models perform in predicting PH in patients with ILD.

Methods: Patients with ILD who completed a baseline right heart catheterization, from Inova Fairfax Hospital, Northwestern Memorial Hospital, and Asan Medical Center in Korea were enrolled. The performance of various prediction models (FORD model, the FORD calculator, the PH-ILD Detection tool, and the mean pulmonary artery pressure prediction model) were assessed using receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves and area under the receiver operating characteristic curve (AUROC). There were four definitions of pulmonary hypertension against which the models were evaluated.

Results: There were a total of 192 patients with ILD, of whom 32.8% (n = 63/192) met the modified 5th world symposium on PH definition of precapillary PH. Among the models assessed, the FORD calculator had an AUROC (0.733) that was marginally highest. Subgroup analysis revealed that the FORD index had the highest AUROC (0.817) in patients with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, while the FORD calculator had the highest AUROC (0.751) in patients with non-IPF ILD.

Conclusion: The FORD model can be used to predict group 3 PH in both IPF patients and non-IPF ILD patients. It could serve as a tool for ILD patient selection for right heart catheterization as well as an enrichment tool for clinical trials targeting the pulmonary vasculature.