The Frequency of and Reasons for Hospital Readmission Post Percutaneous Coronary Intervention

Abstract

ObjectivesThe objective of this study was to determine the frequency of and reasons for six months unplanned readmission to hospital post Percutaneous Coronary Intervention (PCI).BackgroundPCI has become an important and effective way of treating heart disease; however the occurrence of hospital readmission post PCI is not well documented.MethodsThe frequency of hospital readmissions were tracked for six months following PCI using the APPROACH registry database. The incidence of and reasons for hospital readmission were determined using the Capital Health Region Administrative Database and the ICD-10 coding for hospital readmission.ResultsOf 2641 subjects, it was observed that 4.5% of patients were readmitted to hospital within six months of PCI and 18.6% of patients visited the ED for reasons directly related to PCI. The top reasons for readmission were chest pain (31.2%), atherosclerotic heart disease (24.3%), bleeding/complications with anticoagulation (10.9%), myocardial infarction (7.5%) and procedural complications (3.7%). Factors shown to be independent predictors of hospital readmission were congestive heart failure (p = 0.009), pulmonary disease (p = 0.008), malignancy (p = 0.002), liver disease (p = 0.012) and female gender (p = 0.015).ConclusionsThe data indicates that while in-patient six months unplanned hospital readmission post PCI is relatively low, ED visits are substantial. The creation of a post PCI clinic and/or a post PCI hotline may prove to be useful in decreasing hospital visits post PCI. If patients are routinely followed up in the early post PCI period, access to health care may be improved, allowing complications to be observed sooner and care to be given quicker.