Drug eluting stents: data from a clinical registry

Area of Science:

• Cardiology
• Interventional Cardiology

Background:

• Drug-eluting stents (DES) are widely used for percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI).
• Assessing their real-world effectiveness and patient characteristics is crucial for clinical practice guidelines.

Purpose of the Study:

• To evaluate the characteristics of patients undergoing PCI with DES.
• To determine the short-term clinical outcomes of DES implantation in routine practice.

Main Methods:

• An observational study conducted at Aga Khan University Hospital between 2002 and 2003.
• Included 141 patients who underwent PCI with DES.
• Utilized database review and clinical records for data collection, with 6-9 month follow-up via records and phone interviews.

Main Results:

• The study population (n=141) was predominantly male (77%), with a mean age of 55 years, and high prevalence of diabetes (39%) and hypertension (53%).
• Major adverse cardiac events (MACE), including death, myocardial infarction (MI), and target lesion revascularization (TLR), occurred in 6.8% of patients.
• Specific adverse events included 8% with clinical angina, 3.8% with MI, and 4.6% requiring TLR. The sole death was attributed to heart failure with a patent stent.

Conclusions:

• Drug-eluting stents are utilized across diverse patient profiles in routine clinical practice.
• The short-term outcomes of DES in this real-world setting are excellent and comparable to findings from randomized controlled trials.