Heart block complicating acute MI: does it impact long term outcomes in the PCI era?

From a nationwide database:

This study was conducted to investigate the prognostic value of heart block among patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI) treated with drug-eluting stents. A total of 13,862 patients with AMI, registered in the nation-wide AMI database from January 2005 to June 2013, were analyzed. Second- (Mobitz type I or II) and third-degree atrioventricular block were considered as heart block in this study. Thirty-day major adverse cardiac events (MACE) including all causes of death, recurrent myocardial infarction, and revascularization were evaluated. Percutaneous coronary intervention with implantation of drug-eluting stent was performed in 89.8% of the patients. Heart block occurred in 378 patients (2.7%). Thirty-day MACE occurred in 1,144 patients (8.2%). Patients with heart block showed worse clinical parameters at initial admission, and the presence of heart block was associated with 30-day MACE in univariate analyses. However, the prognostic impact of heart block was not significant after adjustment of potential confounders (p = 0.489). Among patients with heart block, patients with a culprit in the left anterior descending (LAD) coronary artery had worse clinical outcomes than those of patients with a culprit in the left circumflex or right coronary artery. LAD culprit was a significant risk factor for 30-day MACE even after controlling for confounders (odds ratio 5.28, 95% confidence interval 1.22 to 22.81, p = 0.026). In conclusion, despite differences in clinical parameters at the initial admission, heart block was not an independent risk factor for 30-day MACE in adjusted analyses. However, a LAD culprit was an independent risk factor for 30-day MACE among patients with heart block.