OBJECTIVE

The aim of this study was to determine the influence of gender on in hospital outcome in patients with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) who underwent primary angioplasty (PA).

DESIGN AND SCOPE

Prospective study of a cohort of patients consecutively admitted to the Coronary Unit of a tertiary hospital in the period of January to October 2004 with the diagnoses of IAMEST and treated with PA.

PATIENTS

Consecutive sample of 86 patients with this diagnosis divided into two groups based on sex: 52 men and 34 women.

MAIN VARIABLES OF INTEREST

In both groups, we analyzed the baseline clinical-demographic characteristics, extension of the coronary disease (ECD), success of the PA, appearance of heart failure (HF) and in-hospital mortality in the first 28 days after admission. We analyzed predictors of mortality in a multivariate model.

RESULTS

The women were older (70+/-8 versus 65+/-11; p=0.02) and had greater prevalence of diabetes (37% versus 18%; p=0.002) and hypertension (58% versus 37%; p<0.001) than the men while the men had greater frequency of smoking (34% versus 22%; p=0.001). There were no differences in the presence of hyperlipidemia, ECD or the success of PA. Women had a higher incidence of HF on admission (22% versus 12%; p=0.01) and in-hospital mortality (17% versus 8%; p=0.002). In the multivariate analyses, female sex and HF on admission continued to be predictors of in-hospital mortality.

CONCLUSIONS

In our study, female gender was an independent predictor of in-hospital mortality in patients with IAMEST treated with PA.