Gait and fate: Baseline gait speed and mortality after transcatheter aortic valve implantation

Predicting 5-Year Clinical Outcomes After Transcatheter or Surgical Aortic Valve Replacement (a Risk Score from the SURTAVI Trial)

Risk prediction scores for long-term outcomes after transcatheter aortic valve implantation (TAVI) or surgical aortic valve replacement (SAVR) are lacking. This study aimed to develop preprocedural risk scores for 5-year clinical outcomes after TAVI or SAVR. This analysis included 1,660 patients at an intermediate surgical risk with severe aortic stenosis randomly assigned to TAVI (n = 864) or SAVR (n = 796) from the SURTAVI (Surgical Replacement and Transcatheter Aortic Valve Implantation) trial. The primary end point was a composite of all-cause mortality or disabling stroke at 5 years. The secondary end point was a composite of cardiovascular mortality or hospitalizations for valve disease or worsening heart failure at 5 years. Preprocedural multivariable predictors of clinical outcomes were used to calculate a simple risk score for both procedures. At 5 years, the primary end point occurred in 31.3% of the patients with TAVI and 30.8% of the patients with SAVR. Preprocedural predictors differed between TAVI and SAVR. Baseline anticoagulant use was a common predictor for events in both procedures, whereas male sex and a left ventricular ejection fraction <60% were significant predictors for events in patients with TAVI and SAVR, respectively. A total of 4 simple scoring systems were created based on these multivariable predictors. The C-statistics of all models were modest but performed better than the contemporary risk scores. In conclusion, preprocedural predictors of events differ between TAVI and SAVR, necessitating separate risk models. Despite the modest predictive value of the SURTAVI risk scores, they appeared superior to other contemporary scores. Further research is needed to strengthen and validate our risk scores, possibly by including biomarker and echocardiographic parameters.

Clinical implications of troponin-T elevations following TAVR: Troponin Increase Following TAVR

BACKGROUND

Baseline and post-procedural elevations in serum troponin-T levels are associated with increased morbidity and mortality following transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR). However, the prognostic impact of change in serum troponin-T level following TAVR remains unknown.

METHODS

Among the patients with severe aortic stenosis who underwent TAVR, those with baseline serum troponin-T level ≥51.5 ng/L were excluded. The impact of increases in serum troponin-T level to an abnormally high range (≥51.5 ng/L) following TAVR on 2-year cardiovascular death or heart failure readmissions was investigated.

RESULTS

Among 189 included patients (median 86 years old, 28% men), serum troponin-T level increased in 79 patients following TAVR. An increase in serum troponin-T was associated with a higher rate of 30-day adverse events, predominantly due to pacemaker implantation for complete atrio-ventricular block, and a higher 2-year cumulative incidence of the primary endpoint (hazard ratio 5.24, 95% confidence interval 1.64-16.8, p = 0.005) adjusted for the potential confounders.

CONCLUSION

Post-procedural increase in serum troponin-T level was associated with adverse clinical outcomes following TAVR.

Effects of cardiac rehabilitation on physical function and exercise capacity in elderly cardiovascular patients with frailty

BACKGROUND

The effects of cardiac rehabilitation (CR) on long-term prognosis of cardiovascular disease (CVD) are well known. However, the effect of CR on frail CVD patients has not been fully addressed.

METHODS

This study consisted of 89 CVD patients with their age ≥65 years old (68 males, 75 ± 6 years), who participated in the outpatient CR program for 3 months. All the patients underwent cardiopulmonary exercise testing and the physical frailty was assessed using the Japanese Version of the Cardiovascular Health Study Standard before and after CR. Based on the assessment of frailty before CR, the patients were divided into the following two groups: frailty group (n = 23) and non-frailty group (n = 66: robust in 10 and pre-frail in 56 patients).

RESULTS

In the frailty group, 20 patients (87%) improved from frail status after CR, and usual walking speed, maximal grip strength, and lower extremity strength were significantly improved (1.06±0.20 vs. 1.20±0.18 m/sec, p<0.001; 21.7 ± 5.5 vs. 23.6 ± 6.3 kg, p<0.01; 0.37±0.09 vs. 0.43±0.11 kgf/kg, p = 0.001, respectively), but peak VO₂ did not change after CR (15.9 ± 3.1 vs. 16.2 ± 3.8 ml/min/kg, NS). In the non-frailty group, all these parameters were significantly improved after CR (1.24±0.19 vs. 1.29±0.23 m/sec, p<0.05, 28.7 ± 7.0 vs. 30.2 ± 7.3 kg, p<0.001, 0.50±0.18 vs. 0.54±0.13 kgf/kg, p<0.05, 17.7 ± 4.7 vs 18.5 ± 4.2 ml/min/kg, p<0.01, respectively).

CONCLUSION

Short-term CR could obtain the improvement of the physical function, providing the prerequisite step for possibly following improvement of exercise capacity in elderly CVD patients with frailty. It may be inferred that longer duration of CR would be needed to obtain the improvement of exercise capacity in these patients, being the future consideration to be determined.

Modified essential frailty toolset to determine outcomes following transcatheter aortic valve replacement

BACKGROUND

Several predictors are available to guide patient selection for transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR) to achieve better outcomes, and the essential frailty toolset (EFT) has been reported as one of those predictors. This study investigated whether a modified EFT could independently predict all-cause mortality following TAVR.

METHODS

The study population comprised 176 consecutive patients with severe aortic stenosis whose frailty was assessed with a modified EFT prior to TAVR at the Sakakibara Heart Institute between 2013 and 2018. The primary endpoint was all-cause mortality following TAVR. To understand the association between the modified EFT and all-cause mortality, multivariate Cox regression analysis was performed. In addition, to understand its predictive performance, we conducted a receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis.

RESULTS

Patients were elderly, relatively frail, and were likely to have significant heart failure symptoms. By the modified EFT definition, 40 patients (22.7%) were considered frail. With a median follow up of 1145 days, all-cause mortality at 1, 2, and 3 years was 6.2%, 10.2%, and 18.3%, respectively. Patients assessed as more frail on the clinical frailty scale had higher modified EFT scores. In ROC analysis, the area under the curve for predicting all-cause mortality at 1, 2, and 3 years was 0.79 [95% confidence interval (CI) 0.68-0.90]; 0.74 (95% CI 0.62-0.84); and 0.67 (95% CI 0.56-0.79), respectively, with the best cut-off modified EFT score of 1/2.

CONCLUSIONS

The modified EFT score was independently associated with all-cause mortality and had excellent predictive performance for all-cause mortality at 1 year.