Impacto de la guardia de cardiología en el tratamiento de reperfusión de los pacientes con IAMCEST en un centro de segundo nivel

Introduction and objectives

The care of patients with cardiovascular disease by specialist in cardiology has shown better results in different spectrums. However, the presence of an on-call cardiologist is still rare in non-tertiary hospitals.

Methods

STEMI was recorded consecutively between 2006 and 2016 in a second level center. We analyzed and compared two periods: regional heart attack care network without a cardiology guard (2006-2011) and a second period (2012-2016) with both measures working.

Results

1524 patients were included, 47.2% after the start of cardiology shift. We observed an increase in primary angioplasty (34.3% to 75.7%, P < .001) as well as a reduction in door-to-balloon time of 64 minutes (220 [IQR, 167-290] to 156 [IQR, 130-197], P < .001). This translates into a shorter hospital stay as well as a reduction in complications during hospitalization, mainly recurrent ischemia. Although there is a trend towards lower hospital mortality, mortality during follow-up did not change with the cardiology guard.

Conclusions

The presence of a cardiologist on call increases the number of patients reperfused, and shortens the time until it. This translates into a shorter hospital stay, as well as lower short-term mortality. Our results indicate that the creation of the cardiological guard brings additional benefit to the care network for patients with STEMI.

ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT02501070.