New AHA Calculations Show Angioplasty Was Performed Half as Often as Previously Reported

December 16, 2010—The American Heart Association (AHA) Heart Disease and Stroke Statistics 2011 Update has been published online ahead of print in Circulation.

The Society for Cardiovascular Angiography and Interventions (SCAI) noted that the report significantly revises downward the number of coronary angioplasty procedures performed annually.

According to SCAI, the AHA's new method of reporting percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) avoids a past practice of duplicative counting, wherein a single procedure including balloon angioplasty to open a blocked artery with concurrent stent implantation was counted twice. The new, more accurate method of counting PCI procedures reduces the number of PCIs recorded per year by approximately half, from nearly 1.3 million reported for 2006 in the 2010 report to 0.6 million in this year's analysis of 2007 data. Previously, the AHA had used the larger number but had noted in a table that the number was based on double counting the 91% of PCIs that included balloon angioplasty and stent placement.

SCAI also noted that data from the US Agency for Health Care Research and Quality (AHRQ) corroborates the significantly smaller number of PCIs performed annually in the United States. The most recent AHRQ report indicates 688,036 angioplasties were performed in 2007. These data are particularly relevant to analyses about use of revascularization procedures in recent years. Calculations using AHRQ data suggest the number of heart revascularizations (PCI and bypass surgery) increased 32% between 1993 and 2008, a period when the US population grew by 17%.

“SCAI welcomes this clarification of the number of PCIs performed annually, as accuracy about procedural volume is of utmost importance as the country develops strategies for improving healthcare systems and reducing costs,” commented SCAI president Larry S. Dean, MD. “It should give everyone pause to realize that the main citation was incorrectly doubled. We hope government agencies, health care economists, journalists, and others participating in the health care debate with new perspective on the growth of interventional procedures in recent years.”