Reduced risk of death and relapse compared to opening just one center.
A study has shown that when an older person has a heart attack, revascularization surgery, which opens not only problematic blood vessels but also narrowed arteries, reduces the risk of death as well as the risk of a heart attack or stroke.
Because older heart attack patients have other conditions and may be weak, doctors often leave only the damaged vessel open while leaving other partially blocked vessels intact. However, according to a research team at the Ferrara University Hospital in Italy, removing all blocked blood vessels reduced the risk of death, another heart attack or stroke, and reduced the need for other surgeries.
In a clinical study on 1,445 male and female patients over 75 years of age, a research team performed a procedure that opened only blocked heart arteries or all major blocked arteries. The results showed that 9% of patients who had all narrowed arteries opened died within a year or had another heart attack, compared to 14% of patients who had only one problematic artery opened.
In addition, 16% of patients who had all narrowed arteries opened were at risk of death, another heart attack or stroke, or needed another procedure, and 21% of those who opened only one artery had an artery blocked.
Dr. Simone Viscaglia (cardiologist) of the research team said: “Doctors are worried about complications, so the standard of care for older patients is to treat only the affected area.” disease or who has developed a vascular disease.”
Other experts agree that treatment of all severely blocked arteries should be the standard, regardless of the age of the patient. Dr. Greg Furnarow, Director of the Ahmanson-UCLA Center for Cardiomyopathy, USA, said: “This clinical study shows that total revascularization can be performed to treat all major coronary artery occlusions in patients with heart failure. focusing only on the artery in question.”
The results of this study (“Complete or Guilty PCI in Elderly Patients with Myocardial Infarction”) were published in the New England Journal of Medicine.