Outcome of percutaneous coronary intervention with drug-eluting stents in unprotected left main versus non-left main native coronary artery disease: results from the prospective multicenter German DES.DE registry

Unprotected left main coronary artery (ULMCA) disease is considered an indication for surgical revascularization. However, refined percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) technology and modern drug-eluting stents (DES) render the ULMCA a target for interventional treatment.

Between October 2005 and September 2009, 374 patients receiving DES in ULMCA and 18,678 patients receiving DES in non-left main coronary arteries (nLMCA) with no previous coronary artery bypass graft surgery, were registered at 130 DES.DE sites. The composite of death, myocardial infarction (MI), and stroke defined as major adverse cardiac and cerebrovascular events (MACCE) and target vessel revascularization (TVR) were defined as primary endpoints. Baseline clinical and descriptive morphology of coronary artery disease revealed more comorbidities and more complex anatomies in the ULMCA group. At 1-year follow-up, the ULMCA group suffered from higher rates of overall death (5.6 versus 2.3 %; p < 0.0001), stroke (2.0 versus 0.8 %; p < 0.05), MACCE (8.6 versus 4.9 %; p < 0.01); whereas rates for definite/probable stent thrombosis (2.4 versus 1.6 %; p = 0.29), TVR (14.2 versus 10.8 %; p = 0.06) and MI (1.3 versus 1.9 %; p = 0.44) were not statistically different. These results persisted even after adjustment for different baseline characteristics, except MACCE that was no longer statistically significant.

Data collected in DES.DE revealed that ULMCA PCI with DES result in similar TVR rates as compared to PCI in nLMCA. Moreover, modern DES have not offset the higher comorbidity index and higher procedure-related complication rate with PCI of ULMCA lesions.