Objective: High on-treatment platelet reactivity (HTPR) has been linked to cardiovascular (CV) events after a percutaneous coronary intervention. There have been some controversies on whether a high maintenance dose (MD) of clopidogrel is effective for HTPR patients. Thus, we carried out a meta-analysis to assess the efficacy and safety of a high MD of clopidogrel in patients with HTPR.
Methods: Searches of PubMed (from 1966 to May 2014), EMBASE (from 1974 to May 2014), and the Cochrane Library (2 May 2014) were performed. All randomized-controlled trials assessing the efficacy and safety of a high MD of clopidogrel in patients with HTPR were included.
Results: A total of eight randomized-controlled trials including 3865 patients were included for analysis. In patients with HTPR, high-dose clopidogrel significantly reduced the risk of major adverse CV events or major adverse cardiac and cerebrovascular events [risk ratio (RR) 0.59; 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.39-0.88], stent thrombosis (RR 0.43; 95% CI 0.20-0.92), and target vessel revascularization (RR 0.31; 95% CI 0.10-0.93), without increasing major bleeding (RR 0.75; 95% CI 0.43-1.31) compared with standard-dose clopidogrel.
Conclusion: A high MD of clopidogrel may be a feasible and readily available treatment to lower the risk of recurrent CV events in patients with HTPR after undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention, especially in HTPR patients with coronary artery disease and chronic kidney disease.