Five-Year Results of Coronary Artery Bypass Grafting With or Without Carotid Endarterectomy in Patients With Asymptomatic Carotid Artery Stenosis: CABACS RCT.

Background: In patients with coronary artery disease and concomitant asymptomatic severe carotid stenosis, combined simultaneous coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) and carotid endarterectomy (CEA) has been widely performed despite lack of evidence from randomized trials. We recently showed that the risk of stroke or death within 30 days was higher following CABG+CEA compared with CABG alone. Here, we report long-term outcomes following CABG with versus without CEA.
Methods: The CABACS (Coronary Artery Bypass Graft Surgery in Patients With Asymptomatic Carotid Stenosis Study) is a randomized, controlled, multicenter, open trial. Patients with asymptomatic severe (≥70%) carotid stenosis undergoing CABG were allocated either CABG+CEA or CABG alone, and follow-up was 5 years. Major secondary end points included nonfatal stroke or death, any death and any nonfatal stroke. Due to low recruitment, the study was stopped prematurely after randomization of 127 patients in 17 centers.
Results: By 5 years, the rate of stroke or death did not significantly differ between groups (CABG+CEA 40.6% [95% CI, 0.285-0.536], CABG alone 35.0% [95% CI, 0.231-0.484]; P =0.58). Higher albeit statistically nonsignificant rates of nonfatal strokes occurred at any time following CABG+CEA versus CABG alone (1 year: 19.3% versus 7.1%, P =0.09; 5 years: 29.4% versus 18.8%, P =0.25). All-cause mortality up to 5 years was similar in both groups (CABG+CEA: 25.4% versus CABG alone: 23.3%, hazard ratio, 1.148 [95% CI, 0.560-2.353]; P =0.71). Subgroup analyses did not reveal any significant effect of age, sex, preoperative modified Rankin Scale and center on outcome events.
Conclusions: During 5-years follow-up, combined simultaneous CABG+CEA was associated with a higher albeit statistically nonsignificant rate of stroke or death compared with CABG alone. This was mainly due to a nonsignificantly higher perioperative risk following CABG+CEA. Since the power of our study was not sufficient, no significant effect of either procedure could be observed at any time during follow-up.
Registration: URL: http://www.controlled-trials.com; Unique identifier: ISRCTN13486906.