Socioeconomic Status Affects Angioplasty Outcomes

Researchers find that low-income patients are more likely to experience major cardiac events

TUESDAY, May 16 (HealthDay News) -- In patients who undergo a percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), one-year outcomes are worse in patients with a lower socioeconomic status than those who have a higher income, according to research presented recently at the American Heart Association's 7th Scientific Forum on Quality of Care and Outcomes Research in Washington, D.C.

Sandeep Nathan, M.D., of Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, and colleagues studied 386 PCI patients, 191 of whom were classified as having a lower socioeconomic status (income below the median of $35,283) and 188 of whom were classified as higher socioeconomic status (income above the median of $35,283). They followed the patients for one year and evaluated major adverse cardiac events (MACE): death, myocardial infarction and urgent target vessel revascularization.

After adjusting for baseline risk factors, the researchers found that the lower socioeconomic status group had a significantly lower one-year MACE-free survival rate than the higher socioeconomic status group (74 percent versus 89 percent) and higher mortality (7.3 percent versus 3.2 percent).

"This is the first report to our knowledge identifying a socioeconomic status-linked hazard in the context of contemporary PCI, in a standardized health care access setting," the authors conclude.

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