OBJECTIVE:
To compare clinical outcome in patients undergoing conventional coronary artery bypass graft surgery who received intermittent antegrade warm blood cardioplegia or intermittent antegrade cold blood cardioplegia for myocardial protection.
METHODS:
The observational, prospective non-randomised analytical comparative study was conducted at the Punjab Institute of Cardiology, Lahore, and Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi Institute of Cardiology, Multan, from September 2012 to October 2013, and comprised patients undergoing coronary artery bypass graft surgery. They were divided into two groups, with Group I having those who received intermittent antegrade warm blood cardioplegia, and Group II having those who received intermittent antegrade cold blood cardioplegia. SPSS 16 was used for statistical analysis.
RESULTS:
Of the 215 patients, 94(44%) were in Group I, and 121(56%) in Group II. Total surgical time in Group II was 119.26±22.24 minutes compared to 105.73±31.34 in Group I (p >0.0001). Spontaneous resumption of sinus rhythm and peri-operative myocardial infarction was statistically insignificant (p>0.05). There were 21(17.4%) patients in Group II to whom peri-operative myocardial infarction occurred compared to 9(9.6%) in Group I (p=0.10).
CONCLUSIONS:
Intermittent antegrade warm blood cardioplegia showed better myocardial protection in early postoperative period compared to intermittent antegrade cold blood cardioplegia.
