Temporal Change in the Remaining Life Expectancy in People Who Underwent Percutaneous Coronary Intervention

Whether percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) is effective in improving long-term survival in an Australian PCI cohort remains unclear. We aimed to examine the change in the remaining life expectancy for patients who underwent PCI over the past decade. Patient data from the Melbourne Interventional Group were divided into four 3-year periods (2005 to 2007, 2008 to 2010, 2011 to 2013, and 2014 to 2016) for survival analysis. The primary outcome was time to death after PCI. Kaplan–Meier survival curves for overall survival were constructed to estimate the 5-year survival. To extrapolate the overall survival curve to the lifetime time horizon, 6 parametric survival distributions were fitted to the individual patient-level data against the Kaplan–Meier curve. The best fit distribution was selected based on goodness-of-fit statistics and expert opinion. The combination of annual mortality post-PCI from the parametric survival analysis and the background mortality by age informed the overall mortality rate. The life expectancy was compared with the general Australians. In addition, the utility weight of post-PCI patients was used to estimate the quality-adjusted life years gained. A total of 27,301 patients with a mean age of 64.4 ± 12 years were included. The base-case results showed that over the 4 time periods, the remaining life expectancy for patients aged 64.4 years on average at the time of PCI remained relatively stable except for period 4: 18.12 years (2005 to 2007), 17.56 years (2008 to 2010), 18.39 years (2011 to 2013), and 17.25 years (2014 to 2016), respectively. The quality-adjusted life years gained showed a similar trend: 14.86 (2005 to 2007), 14.40 (2008 to 2010), 15.07 (2011 to 2013), and 14.13 (2014 to 2016) separately. In conclusion, the widened gap in life expectancy in post-PCI patients versus the general Australian over the 2014 to 2016 period suggests the need for improved implementation of prevention strategies for coronary heart disease. Enhanced disease management after PCI that lowers residual mortality risk is recommended to extend the survival of patients with coronary heart disease.