Despite the increasing incidence of acute coronary syndrome (ACS) in Japan, its prognosis has improved. However, there is a paucity of longitudinal registry data providing trends of in-hospital care and prognosis of ACS in Japan. ACS patients undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) included in the Shinken Database 2004-2014 were divided into two groups according to admission year (2004-2009, n = 390; 2010-2014, n = 328). Patient characteristics, lesion/procedure characteristics, medications at discharge, all-cause mortality, cardiovascular death, acute myocardial infarction (AMI), target lesion revascularization (TLR), re-PCI to new lesion, and coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) within 2 years after discharge were compared between the groups. Prevalence of hypertension, dyslipidemia, and dual antiplatelet/statin prescription increased significantly between periods. Usage of second-generation drug-eluting stents (DES) increased markedly between the two periods (2.6, 66.8%), while those of bare metal stents (64.4, 26.5%) and first-generation DES (25.6, 1.5%) decreased (all, p < 0.01). Two-year event-free survival rate increased for all-cause mortality (94.6-98.3%, p = 0.01), TLR (79.4-96.1%, p < 0.01), and re-PCI to new lesion (87.3-95.1%, p < 0.01). There were no significant differences in cardiovascular death, AMI, or CABG between the two periods. The event-free rates for TLR and re-PCI to new lesion in ACS patients have increased over the last decade in Japan. These observations should be confirmed in larger, longitudinal, multicenter registries.
Keywords: Acute coronary syndrome; Percutaneous coronary intervention; Time trend.