Facilitated percutaneous coronary intervention in patients with acute myocardial infarction transferred from remote hospitals

Abstract

Two hundred patients with acute myocardial infarction admitted to hospitals. remote from a interventional center (transfer time >90 minutes) received IV bolus doses of heparin, half-dose alteplase, and abciximab, and were immediately transferred to the interventional center, with continued alteplase and abciximab infusions. Transfer was safe with no deaths. Seventy-one percent of the patients presented with TIMI grade 3 flow in the infarct-related artery at the diagnostic angiography, whereas percutaneous intervention facilitated by this lytic regimen resulted in a final TIMI 3 flow in 93% of patients and low mortality at 30 days (3.5%); however, there were frequent bleeding complications.