Heparin Versus Bivalirudin in Contemporary Percutaneous Coronary Intervention: A Welcome Back to an Old Friend Unfractionated Heparin.

The results of randomized trials and observational studies make a strong argument for the use of bivalirudin rather than heparin plus systematic glycoprotein (GP) IIb/IIIa inhibitors for the great majority of patients undergoing percutaneous coronary interventions (PCI). However, there is no doubt that the benefit observed with bivalirudin was achieved because of the major bleeding complications with heparin plus GP IIb/IIIa inhibitors. Therefore, if we diminish bleeding complications by eliminating the systematic utilization of GP IIb/IIIa inhibitors, there would be a lesser benefit with the use of bivalirudin. When this latter drug was compared with unfractionated heparin alone there was no benefit in ischemic complications but a decrease in major bleeding complications with bivalirudin. However, a very recent meta-analysis shed more insights on the utilization of bivalirudin versus heparin regimens during PCI. Findings from this meta-analysis suggest that routine use of bivalirudin offers little advantage over heparin among PCI patients. In a detailed analysis of some randomized trials and observational studies with bivalirudin in non-ST-segment elevation acute coronary syndrome patients done by myself and published almost 4 years ago in this journal, I rendered some reflections on the future widespread use of bivalirudin. "In the setting of PCI and in the absence of GP IIb/IIIa inhibitors, bivalirudin did not offer any beneficial effect in the incidence of the composite end points when compared with heparin. For now, in real world practice, one would probably choose a well-known cheaper drug that has already passed the test of time, heparin. There may be reinforcement in the sole utilization of heparin confining GP IIb/IIIa inhibitors and other intravenous antithrombotics to bailout therapy for periprocedural PCI complications in acute coronary syndrome patients." Therefore, is it the beginning of a new era with bivalirudin or is it a welcome back to an old friend, heparin? Indeed, after more than two decades, it is always good to welcome back an old friend, unfractionated heparin.