In a nutshell
This paper studied whether remote ischemic preconditioning could reduce heart and kidney complications in patients who underwent percutaneous coronary intervention.
Some background
Percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) is a procedure used to improve blood flow. Complications sometimes occur during or after a patient undergoes PCI. These complications include heart attack and acute kidney injury. Drugs have been used to reduce such complications. However, new methods still need to be developed. In remote ischemic preconditioning (RIPC), the blood supply to an organ is periodically restricted. This causes the organ to be more tolerant to restricted blood supply.
Methods & findings
The current analysis examined whether RIPC could reduce the rates of heart and kidney complications following PCI.
The results of eleven trials with a total of 1713 patients were analyzed in this study. These patients underwent non-emergency PCI procedures.
Overall, 33.35% of patients had a heart attack. Patients who underwent RIPC were 32% less likely to have a heart attack. This effect was more pronounced in male patients.
Overall, 6.99% of patients had an acute kidney injury (abrupt loss to kidney function). Patients who underwent RIPC were 39% less likely to have an acute kidney injury.
The bottom line
The authors concluded that RIPC reduces the occurrence of heart attack and acute kidney injury in patients undergoing PCI.
What’s next?
Talk to you doctor about having remote ischemic preconditioning before a percutaneous coronary intervention.
Published By :
PLOS ONE
Date :
Dec 31, 2014
