Impact of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease on prognosis after percutaneous coronary intervention and bypass surgery for left main coronary artery disease: an analysis from the EXCEL trial

OBJECTIVES Percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) is often favoured over coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) surgery for revascularization in patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD). We studied whether COPD affected clinical outcomes according to revascularization in the Evaluation of XIENCE Versus Coronary Artery Bypass Surgery for Effectiveness of Left Main Revascularization (EXCEL) trial, in which PCI with everolimus-eluting stents was non-inferior to CABG for the treatment of patients with left main coronary artery disease and low or intermediate SYNTAX scores. METHODS Patients with a history of COPD were propensity score matched to those without COPD. Outcomes at 30days and 3years in both groups were compared in patients randomized to PCI versus CABG. RESULTS COPD status was available for 1901 of 1905 randomized patients (99.8%), 148 of whom had COPD (7.8%). Propensity score matching yielded 135 patients with COPD and 675 patients without COPD. Patients with COPD had higher 3-year rates of the primary composite end point of death, myocardial infarction or stroke (31.7% vs 14.5%, P<0.0001), death (17.1% vs 7.5%, P=0.0005) and myocardial infarction (18.3% vs 7.3%, P<0.0001), but not stroke (3.3% vs 2.9%, P=0.84). There were no statistically significant interactions in the relative risks of PCI versus CABG for the primary composite end point in patients with and without COPD at 30days [hazard ratio (HR) 0.39, 95% confidence interval (CI) 0.12-1.21 vs HR 0.55, 95% CI 0.29-1.06; P-interaction=0.61] or at 3years (HR 0.85, 95% CI 0.46-1.56 vs HR 1.28, 95% CI 0.84-1.94; P-interaction=0.27). CONCLUSIONS In the EXCEL trial, COPD was independently associated with poor prognosis after left main coronary artery disease revascularization. The relative risks of PCI versus CABG at 30days and 3years were consistent in patients with and without COPD. Clinical trial registration number http://www.clinicaltrials.gov; NCT01205776.