CORONARY ARTERY DISEASE IN THE ELDERLY

Objective: The objective of our study is to assess the severity of coronary artery disease in the elderly and predict the safetyoutcome of coronary angiography. Study design: A cross sectional observational study. Setting: AFIC/NIHD Rawalpindi. Period: February2011 and August 2011. Method: The study population included 100 elderly patients (age>60years) undergoing coronary angiography.Coronary angiography data were obtained from the Siemens Queries software system, which maintains the database including detailedangiographic findings of all patients at this institution. Significant lesions were defined as those with >70% diameter narrowing of coronaryarteries (>50% for the left main coronary artery). We attempted to quantify the “severity of CAD” by ascertaining the prevalence of high-riskcoronary anatomy (HRCA, defined as >50% stenosis of the left main coronary artery and/or significant three-vessel coronary artery disease).More than 70% stenosis in more than one coronary artery was considered as severe coronary artery disease. Results: Our study cohortcomprised of 100 consecutive subjects 82 (82.0%) men and 18 (18.0%) women with a mean age of 78.6 years (Range 70 years - 94 years). 77patients (77.0%) had severe coronary artery disease; 50 with triple vessel coronary artery disease (TVCAD) 1 with TVCAD with Left Main StemDisease, 26 had double coronary artery disease (DVCAD). 12 patients (12.0%) had moderate coronary artery disease with single vesselinvolvement (SVCAD), 6 patients (6.0%) had subcritical coronary artery disease with < 60 % stenosis in any of the vessel while only 5 patients(5%) had a normal coronary angiogram. Conclusions: Patients of elderly age group have more severe CAD and coronary angiography is arelatively safe procedure.