Does an invasive strategy improve outcomes in patients with acute myocardial infarction treated with thrombolysis?
This editorial discusses the TIMI II trial, which evaluated the role of an invasive strategy following thrombolysis in acute myocardial infarction.
The results of phase II of the National Institutes of Health–sponsored Thrombolysis in Myocardial Infarction trial (TIMI II), which appear in this issue of the Journal,1 constitute a giant step forward in our understanding of the treatment of acute myocardial infarction. TIMI II has important implications for patient care and the organization and cost of health care services.In this study, 3262 patients with acute myocardial infarction of less than four hours' duration were treated first with intravenous recombinant tissue plasminogen activator, heparin, and aspirin. They were then randomly assigned to treatment according to either an invasive strategy or . . .
Guerci et al. (Thu,) studied this question.