Coronary Events in Patients Presenting for Repair of Acute Type A Aortic Dissection

Preoperative coronary angiography is often not performed in acute Type A dissection. We examined differences in the incidence of pre-existing coronary disease and subsequent coronary events between patients undergoing acute Type A dissection repair and patients undergoing elective proximal aortic aneurysm repair.

From 2000 to 2015, there were 154 acute Type A dissection repairs and 457 elective proximal aortic aneurysm repairs. We performed a retrospective review to evaluate preoperative coronary disease and postoperative coronary interventions such as percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) and coronary bypass grafting (CABG).

A total of 31 (20%) dissection patients and 123 (27%) elective surgery patients had preoperative evidence of coronary artery disease (p = 0.094). All elective surgery patients but only six (4%) dissection patients had preoperative coronary catheterization. More CABGs were performed in the elective surgery group (19%) than in the dissection group (3%, p < 0.001). There were no differences in the incidence of prior PCI, CABG, or myocardial infarction between groups. Following dissection repair, four patients required coronary interventions. Of these, two (1.3%) experienced chest pain and underwent PCI at 4.7 and 4.3 months postoperatively, respectively, and another two experienced symptoms and required PCI at 5 and 7 years, respectively. The 30-day and 14-year mortality rates after dissection repair were 13% and 24%, respectively. Although the dissection group had poorer survival than the elective surgery group (p < 0.001), there was no difference in conditional survival after aortic-related deaths over the first year were censored (p = 0.104).

Given the low incidence of missed significant coronary disease (1.3%), it is reasonable to perform Type A dissection repair without coronary angiography.