BACKGROUND: The transradial approach for percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) is still not widely used in our country. We evaluated the results of transradial PCI performed at a tertiary hospital, which has progressively incorporated this technique to its daily clinical practice. METHODS: This is a retrospective study of patients treated from 2007 to 2012 at Instituto Dante Pazzanese de Cardiologia. Clinical, angiographic and procedural profile and in-hospital outcomes of patients with stable and unstable coronary artery disease (CAD) treated with the transradial approach were compared. RESULTS: We included 2,507 patients, of which 72.6% had stable and 27.4% had unstable CAD. Patients with stable CAD had a more complex clinical profile, characterized by being older, more frequently females, with a higher incidence of comorbidities. The angiographic and procedural characteristics were not different for most of the variables analyzed. The success rate was high, but higher in the stable CAD group (94.6% vs. 92.4%; P = 0.05). The incidence of death (0.2% vs. 0.3%; P = 0.61), peri-procedural infarction (4.7% vs. 6.6%; P = 0.07), stroke (0.1% vs. 0.1%; P > 0.99), PCI (0.1% vs. 0.3%; P = 0.30), coronary artery bypass graft (0 vs. 0.4%; P = 0.06), major bleeding (0.2% vs. 0.6%; P = 0.09) or vascular complications (1% vs. 0.6%; P = 0.47) was low and did not differ between groups. CONCLUSIONS: Transradial PCI has proved to be safe and effective in patients with stable and unstable CAD, treated at a tertiary hospital that has progressively incorporated this technique to its daily practice.
Angioplasty; Radial artery; Angina, stable; Acute coronary syndrome
