High-risk women with acute coronary syndrome benefit as much as men from a trip to the cardiac cath lab shortly after being hospitalized, according to a study reported recently at the Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions (SCAI) 29th Annual Scientific Sessions in Chicago.
The study adds important new information to an ongoing controversy: whether women with acute coronary syndromes fare better with a combination of drug therapy and watchful waiting or--like men--benefit from early angiography and percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI).
"Our findings show that women should not be denied access to the cath lab, particularly high-risk women," said Rachid Elkoustaf, MD, MPH, a senior cardiology fellow at the Henry Low Heart Center at Hartford Hospital in Hartford, CT.
Acute coronary syndromes encompass both unstable angina, or more seriously, a type of heart attack known as non -ST-segment-elevation acute coronary syndrome (NSTE ACS), a name that comes from the shape of the "ST-segment" on the electrocardiogram.
Studies have clearly shown that clinical outcomes are better when high-risk men are quickly taken to the cardiac catheterization laboratory, where an interventional cardiologist threads a catheter into the heart through a nick in an artery in the groin, injects dye to aid in viewing the artery with x-rays, and performs PCI as needed, inflating an angioplasty balloon or placing an expandable stent to open the arterial blockage.