Percutaneous Coronary Interventions in Chronic Total Occlusion - Profile, Technique and Outcome - The Malabar Experience.

Introduction: Percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) of chronic total occlusion (CTO) remains a challenge. The reasons being that these procedures may be lengthy and complex, with elevated radiation exposure, increased contrast load, lower procedural success rate, and a higher risk of complication when compared with non-CTO elective PCI.Clarifying the long-term clinical outcomes of CTO-PCI is very important to justify potential investments in training and technology. However, there is a paucity of data from Indian subcontinent. Hence we decided to report the outcomes from a real-life cohort of consecutive patients undergoing elective PCI for CTO at our institution.
Materials and Methods: Single-center, prospective observational study. A total of 339 consecutive patients who underwent elective PCI for chronic total occlusion between Feb 2016 to Feb 2018 were included in the study. Procedural techniques, complications and clinical outcomes {all-cause death, cardiac death, major adverse cardiac events (MACE) and target vessel revascularization (TVR)} were assessed in our study population.
Results: 339 patients were prospectively followed up for a duration that ranged from 3 months to 36 months, with a median follow up of 24 months. Overall procedural success was achieved in 85.5% (n = 290) cases. No significant differences were noted in In-Hospital adverse events (5.5% vs. 4.1%; p 0.998). MACE rate was significantly higher in unsuccessful CTO group (36.7% vs. 8.9%, p 0.001) and was predominantly driven by Ischemia Driven (ID) - Revascularization (16.3% vs. 3.1%, p < 0.001). Cardiac death and All-cause death was not significantly different between the groups. Residual angina (26.5% vs. 10%, p 0.003) and residual dyspnoea (34.7% vs. 12.4%, p < 0.001) were significantly worse in unsuccessful CTO group.
Conclusions: Procedural success in the present drug-eluting stent (DES) era is more than 80% and newer techniques and hardwares have improved the procedural success rate, especially in younger age groups. MACE rates were significantly higher in the unsuccessful CTO group. Residual angina and dyspnoea were significantly worse in the unsuccessful CTO group.
Competing Interests: All authors declared there is no conflicts of interest in this study and there is no grant and financial support to this study.
(© 2020 Saudi Heart Association.)