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Digital

Publication, Part of

National Angioplasty Audit - 2005

Audit
Publication Date:
Geographic Coverage:
British Isles
Geographical Granularity:
Country, Hospital Trusts
Date Range:
01 Jan 2005 to 31 Dec 2005

Summary

The treatment and care of patients is described in the first National Coronary Angioplasty Audit report, published by The Information Centre for health and social care (The IC).

Coronary heart disease accounts for about one in five deaths in men and one in six deaths in women. In addition, the British Heart Foundation estimate that there are over 1 million men living in the UK who have or have had angina (heart-related chest pain), and over 840,000 women.

Percutaneous Coronary Intervention (PCI) is a rapidly evolving technique used to treat patients whose coronary arteries - which supply the heart with blood - are narrowed or blocked. The audit allows clinicians to assess key aspects of the quality of their care when performing PCI.

This is a United Kingdom wide audit performed by the Audit Officer of the British Cardiovascular Intervention Society (BCIS) with participation from hospitals performing PCI procedures.  

The audit will continue to provide clinicians with crucial information against standards of best practice that they can use to identify opportunities to further improve patient care.

Highlights

  • The number of angiograms and PCI treatments both exceed the numbers expected by the National Service Framework (NSF) for Coronary Heart Disease, but are less than that recommended by the British Cardiovascular Society (BCS). For PCIs, the NSF target in 2000 was 750 per million population (pmp), and the BCS 2003 target was 1,400 pmp, with expectations that the level might need to be 2-3,000 pmp. The actual number in England in 2005 was 1,169 pmp and in Wales 873 pmp. These numbers are also less than in most other developed European countries.
  • In 2005, for every 4 patients who needed revascularisation treatment, 3 were treated by PCI and 1 by CABG. There has been a progressive increase in the ratio of patients treated by PCI to CABG which reflecting advances in PCI technology and treatment of patients earlier in the course of the disease process (when more patients can be successfully treated by PCI).
  • The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) recommend that "Stents should be used routinely where PCI is the clinically appropriate procedure for patients with either stable or unstable angina or with acute myocardial infarction". The great majority of procedures do now involve stent insertion (94 per cent), suggesting that this aspect of good practice is being met.
  • The overall rate of death before discharge from hospital following PCI has remained fairly stable over recent years at around 0.5-0.7 per cent, and there has been a marked fall in the need for emergency coronary artery bypass surgery to try to solve a PCI complication (in 2005, this occurred in less than 0.2 per cent of all procedures).

 

Resources

Last edited: 11 April 2018 4:46 pm