Fibrinolysis and clinical outcomes in acute pulmonary embolism. Madras medical college pulmonary embolism (M-PER) registry from India

Background

Acute pulmonary embolism (APE) is the third most common cause of vascular death. Data on APE from India and other low-and middle-income countries is sparse.

Objectives

Study the clinical characteristics, prognostic factors, in-hospital mortality (IMH) and 12 months mortality of patients with APE in India.

Methods

We prospectively enrolled 186 consecutive patients diagnosed with APE between November 2016 and November 2021 in Madras Medical College Pulmonary Embolism Registry (M-PER). All patients had electrocardiography and echocardiography. High risk patients and selected intermediate risk patients underwent fibrinolysis.

Results

75 % of our patients were below 50 years of age. 35 % were women. The mean time to presentation from symptom onset was 6.04 ± 10.01 days. 92 % had CT pulmonary angiography. Intermediate risk category (61.3 %) was the more common presentation followed by high risk (26.9 %). Electrocardiography showed S1Q3T3 pattern in 56 %. 76 % had right ventricular dysfunction and 12.4 % had right heart thrombi(RHT) by echocardiography. 50.5 % received fibrinolysis. Patients with RHT received fibrinolysis more frequently (78.3 % vs 46.6 %; p = 0.007). In-hospital mortality (IHM) was 15.6 %. Systemic arterial desaturation and need for mechanical ventilation independently predicted IHM. Ten patients (5.3 %) were lost to follow up. One year mortality was 26.7 % (47/176). One year mortality of patients discharged alive was similar among high, intermediate and low risk groups(14.8 % vs 1.9 % vs 10.5 %; p = 0.891).

Conclusions

Patients with PE are often young and present late in India. The in-hospital and 12 months mortality were high. Low and intermediate risk groups had a high post discharge mortality similar to high risk patients.