Arya Atherosclerosis
Volume:18 Issue: 3, Mar 2022

Coronary artery disease (CAD) is among the most common causes of death in almost all countries across the world. Awareness of risk factors for the management and prevention of the disease can reduce complications and mortality rates. This study was conducted with the aim to investigate the mortality and potential risk factors of myocardial infarction (MI) as well as their relationships in patients who were admitted to one university hospital in the North of Iran from 2014 to 2018.

This study had retrospective descriptive design. Using a checklist, all necessary information was extracted from 5-year medical records data of MI patients in the university hospital from 2014 to 2018 (n = 564). The data analysis was performed in SPSS software using descriptive statistics and two binary logistic regression analyses.

The results showed that the mean age of the patients was 62.78 ± 13.38 years, and most of them were men (66.3%). The patients’ mortality was 18.6% in a 5-year analysis. However, the number of mortalities was higher in the women (P = 0.001). Descriptive analysis showed that the most common risk factors of the disease in both genders were hypertension (46.6%), diabetes mellitus (DM) (38.5%), hyperlipidemia (24.1%), smoking (20%), and family history of CVDs (18.8%), respectively. However, the results of the adjusted regression model showed that the odds ratio (OR) of the patients’ mortality increased in diabetic MI patients (OR: 2.33; 95%CI: 1.42-3.81; P = 0.001), but this ratio decreased in MI patients with a history of hyperlipidemia (OR: 0.23; 95%CI: 0.11-0.44; P ˂ 0.001).

Based on the results, individual- and population-based prevention strategies by focusing on hypertension and diabetes are recommended in our health programs. Surprisingly, the mortality rate of MI patients was lower among those with a history of hyperlipidemia. There are different hypotheses for the cause of this. Therefore, laboratory studies with animal models and prospective cohorts are suggested for future studies.

Cardiac problem causes changes in different aspects of life in patients, including their activities of daily living (ADL). Because of the important role of family in caring for patient after pacemaker implantation, this study was done to evaluate the effect of family-centered empowerment model on ADL of patient after pacemaker implantation.

This randomized clinical trial study was performed on 70 patients who underwent pacemaker implantation in Shahid Chamran Hospital, Isfahan, Iran. Patients and their family in the intervention group received educational program according to family-based empowerment program. The control group only received routine interventions. Data were collected using a valid specific quality of life (QOL) questionnaire and analyzed by SPSS software.

Patient's self-efficacy, self-esteem, and personal QOL have been improved after the empowerment program compared with the baseline and the control group (P < 0.05 for all).

The QOL in patients with pacemaker is relatively low. Similar to previous studies, family-centered empowerment model, due to participation of the patients and their families in education, learning, and taking care of the patients, could be an appropriate model to implement.

The current study aimed to determine the optimal cut-off of obesity indices for detecting coronary heart disease (CHD) in 10-year study of Yazd Healthy Heart Cohort (YHHC) in Iran.

A total of 2000 individuals aged 20-74 years were enrolled. All participants without cardiovascular disease (CVD) had a full medical check-up at the start of the study. At the start of the study, a variety of obesity indices were assessed and calculated, including body mass index (BMI), waist circumference (WC), waist-to-hip ratio (WHpR), waist-to-height ratio (WHtR), A Body Shape Index (ABSI), abdominal volume index (AVI), body adiposity index (BAI), and body roundness index (BRI). Coronary artery bypass graft (CABG), percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), myocardial infarction (MI), Rose Angina Questionnaire (RAQ) (chest pain) greater than 3, and electrocardiographic (ECG) changes in favour of the coronary artery disease (CAD) were considered as the CVD risks. A time-dependent receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curve with right-censored data and naive estimator was used to estimate the time-dependent sensitivity and specificity and the best cut-off of the anthropometric indices for CHD risk.

Overall, 1623 participants (818 men and 805 women) with mean and standard deviation (SD) of weight of 71.21 ± 12.94 kg were included. In a 10-year follow-up, 101 [59 (58.42%) men and 42 (41.58%) women] developed CVD event. WHpR demonstrated the largest area under the time-dependent ROC curve (AUC) of 0.65 and 0.63 as well as 95% confidence interval (CI) of 58.64-72.66 and 50.74-75.55 for men and women, respectively, in predicting CVD. Optimal WHpR cut-off was 0.93 and 0.92, respectively, for men and women.

WHpR index was superior to other obesity indices in predicting CHD.

Numerous clinical trials have reported conflicting results regarding the benefit of digoxin in treating heart failure (HF) patients. This study was conducted with the aim to demonstrate the impact of added digoxin to beta-blocker and beta-blocker alone on all-cause mortality and rehospitalization among these patients.

We investigated the data of 1998 patients admitted with a primary diagnosis of decompensated HF in the prospective Persian Heart Failure Patients Registry in Iran. The outcomes of interest were time until death and time until first rehospitalization. Multivariate cox regression was used to compare the impact of beta-blocker plus digoxin and beta-blocker alone on 2.5-year survival and 90-day rehospitalization.

The mean age of the participants was 69.18 ± 13.26 years, and 38.1% of patients were women. The incidence rate of all-cause mortality in the total sample was 0.18 and 0.22 in patients on beta-blocker plus digoxin and beta-blocker alone, respectively [incidence rate ratio (IRR) = 1.25; 95% CI: 0.92-1.7]. The adjusted risk of all-cause mortality was significantly higher in women discharged with beta-blocker plus digoxin than beta-blocker groups [hazard ratio (HR) = 2.31; 95% CI: 1.27-4.19]. Rates of 90-day first rehospitalization were 0.10 and 0.12 in the beta-blocker plus digoxin and beta-blocker alone groups, respectively (IRR = 0.85; 95% CI: 0.53-1.35). After adjustment for covariates, beta-blocker plus digoxin therapy had no significant effect on increasing the risk of 90-day first rehospitalization in the total cohort (HR = 0.77; 95% CI: 0.48-1.23), in men (HR = 0.73; 95% CI: 0.40-1.35), and women (HR = 0.76; 95% CI: 0.36-1.65).

In patients hospitalized with decompensated HF, digoxin administration at discharge was associated with increased 30-month mortality risk in women.

Coronary artery disease (CAD) is a leading cause of death around the world. Micro-ribonucleic acid (miRNA) can be involved in forming of atherosclerotic plaques, inflammation, cholesterol metabolism, and other mechanisms involved in CAD development. This study aimed to evaluate the expression level of miR-22, miR-30c, miR-145, and miR-519d and their possible association with inflammatory markers among patients with CAD.

The expression level of miR-22, miR-30c, miR-145, miR-519d, interleukin 6 (IL-6), and transforming growth factor beta (TGF-β) was determined in peripheral blood mononuclear cells (PBMCs) from 46 patients with CAD and 39 healthy controls using real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) assay.

53.8% (n = 21) and 52.2% (n = 24) of controls and cases were men, respectively; the mean age was 59.8 ± 7.4 and 57.0 ± 9.8 years, respectively. The miRNA expression pattern of each group showed significantly different expression profiles. In the CAD patients group, miR-22, miR-30c, and miR-145 were down-regulated compared to the control group. On the opposite, miR-519d was up-regulated in patients with CAD compared to the control group. Our results also showed that the expression levels of IL-6 and TGF-β were up-regulated among patients with CAD compared to the control group. In addition, the expression of miR-145 and miR-519d had a significantly negative and positive correlation with TGF-β and IL-6, respectively.

The change in expression levels of miR-22, miR-30c, miR-145, and miR-519d in PBMCs of patients with CAD could be considered as a potential biomarker for CAD.

Although intra-cardiac shocks are a lifesaving approach in patients with systolic heart failure (HF), the probable effective factors related to shock occurrence are less frequently recognized. We designed this study to assess the factors associated with inappropriate or appropriate implantable cardioverter-defibrillator (ICD) shocks in patients with non-ischemic cardiomyopathy (NICM).

Ninety-nine patients with NICM who implanted ICD were enrolled from March 2018 to September 2019 and followed up with a three-month interval for up to one year. Shock therapy was defined as either appropriate or inappropriate shock. The odds ratio (OR) of inappropriate shock occurrence was calculated with crude and different adjusted models.

The mean age of the population at baseline was 51.9 ± 15.4 years (men: 71%). Baseline data revealed that patients with inappropriate shocks had higher heart rates (HR), worse New York Heart Association (NYHA) class, and anti-tachycardia pacing (ATP) as well as higher percentages of amiodarone usage compared to groups with appropriate or no shock [HR: 96.8 ± 27.8 vs. 79.8 ± 12.1 vs. 76.2 ± 17.6 beats per minute (bpm), P = 0.014; NYHA class IV: 85.7% vs. 74.1% vs. 63.4%, P = 0.041; ATP: 37.5% vs. 29% vs. 5%, P = 0.010; amiodarone usage: 37.5% vs. 25.8% vs. 5%, P = 0.23, respectively]. Further multiple-adjusted OR did not reveal any significant independent association between the aforementioned variables and inappropriate shock incidence.

This study indicates no significant independent predisposing factor in the occurrence of inappropriate shocks among patients with NICM. Other studies are required in this regard.

The use of dipyridamole for thallium-201 imaging has proved very successful in demonstrating coronary arterial disease, and a combination of dipyridamole and dynamic exercise is becoming widely used. Dipyridamole is safe when given intravenously, although transient noncardiac side effects are common; side effects such as chest pain, headache, and dizziness. These side effects are mostly mild, and can be treated with aminophylline.CASE REPORT: We describe a 45-year-old woman with normal baseline electrocardiography (ECG) and unremarkable physical examination, referred for myocardial thallium scan with dipyridamole. A few seconds after infusion of dipyridamole, her ECG developed first-degree atrioventricular (AV) block, then, 2:1 AV block, complete heart block (CHB), and sinus arrest. After aminophylline infusion, junctional escape rhythm was seen, and a few seconds later, rhythm changed to sinus rhythm. Thallium scan was negative for ischemia.

High-grade AV block after dipyridamole has been described in few case reports, and mostly was associated with transient myocardial ischemia; it seems that the presence of conduction abnormalities at baseline is a risk factor. But in our case, the sinus arrest and AV block occurred without evidence of ischemia in myocardial perfusion imaging, and we think it can be an unwanted complication of dipyridamole; clinicians should be aware of bradyarrhythmia as a possible complication of dipyridamole. An alternative explanation is that this arrhythmia can be caused by vagal activity; and another possibility is that the imaging study was false negative.

In the clinical setting of patients with ST-elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI), there are controversies about the role of early heparin administration on the patients' outcome and the patency of the infarct-related artery (IRA). In this randomized clinical trial, we sought to investigate the effect of heparin administration time on the thrombolysis in myocardial infarction (TIMI) flow grade of patients with STEMI treated with primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PPCI).

Eligible individuals were randomly assigned to two groups: early heparin administration (90 IU/kg) in the emergency department (group A, n = 92) and late heparin administration in the Cath lab (group B, n = 77). All demographic and clinical information and on admission examinations were documented. Clinical outcomes, 40-day mortality, and left ventricular (LV) function improvement in follow-up were also collected.

The mean age of patients was 57.1 ± 8.8 and 57.5 ± 7.5 years in groups A and B, respectively (P = 0.232). The history of hypertension (HTN) (34.8% vs. 53.2%, P = 0.016) and diabetes (14.1% vs. 29.9%, P = 0.013) was significantly lower in group A. The LV ejection fraction (LVEF) changes were significant before and after the intervention within each group. However, this change was not significantly different between the groups (P = 0.592). Post-intervention complications did not differ between the two groups (P > 0.05). In the proportion of cases with TIMI flow grade less than 2 in the IRA, no significant differences were observed between the groups. [P = 0.092 for left anterior descending (LAD) and P = 0.086 for left circumflex artery (LCX)].

Although heparin administration in patients with STEMI undergoing PPCI is safe and effective, the effect appears not to be time-dependent.

Ischemic heart disease (IHD) is the first cause of mortality in the world. Stable coronary artery disease (CAD) is the most common IHD. Medical therapy (MT), percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), and coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) are three strategies for the management of this disease. The main aim of this study was the comparison of MT with PCI or CABG in terms of cardiovascular (CV) mortality, myocardial infarction (MI), unplanned revascularization (UR), stroke, and freedom from angina in managing stable CAD.

The Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, Embase, PubMed, and Scopus were searched. Two reviewers independently appraised the titles and abstracted data of the identified studies. After the Full-text reviewing phase, eligible studies were analyzed through the random-effect meta-analysis method. Finally, a sensitivity analysis was conducted for the robustness of findings.

Nine randomized controlled trials (RCTs) were included. The pooled RR of CV mortality associated with MT compared with PCI and CABG was 1.22 and 1.385, respectively. Overall, The RR of MT associated with MI, UR, stroke, and freedom from angina compared with PCI was 1.001, 1.151, 0.799, and 0.801, respectively.

Our results revealed no statistically significant difference between MT and PCI in terms of studied primary outcomes. The findings also highlighted that there is no statistically significant difference between MT and CABG in terms of CV mortality.