Objectives: To describe the use of drug-eluting stents (DESs) in the largest population of statutory health insurance members in Germany, including newly developed bio-resorbable vascular scaffolds (BVSs), and to evaluate 1-year complication rates of DES as compared with bare metal stents (BMSs) in this cohort.
Design: Routine data analysis of statutory health insurance claims data from the years 2008 to 2014.
Setting: The German healthcare insurance Allgemeine Ortskrankenkasse covers approximately 30% of the German population and is the largest nationwide provider of statutory healthcare insurance in Germany.
Participants and interventions: We included all patients with a claims record for a percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) with either DES or BMS and additionally, from 2013, BVS. Patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI) were excluded.
Main outcome measure: major adverse cerebrovascular and cardiovascular event (MACCE, defined as mortality, AMI, stroke and transient ischaemic attack), bypass surgery, PCI and coronary angiography) at 1 year after the intervention.
Results: A total of 243 581 PCI cases were included (DES excluding BVS: 143 765; BVS: 1440; BMS: 98 376). The 1-year MACCE rate was 7.42% in the DES subgroup excluding BVS and 11.29% in the BMS subgroup. The adjusted OR for MACCE was 0.72 (95% CI 0.70 to 0.75) in patients with DES excluding BVS as compared with patients with BMS. In the BVS group, the proportion of 1-year MACCE was 5.0%.
Conclusion: The analyses demonstrate a lower MACCE rate for PCI with DES. BVSs are used in clinical routine in selected cases and seem to provide a high degree of safety, but data are still sparse.
Keywords: MACCE; administrative data; bio-resorbable vascular scaffolds; drug-eluting stents; healthcare research; safety.
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