Prediction of 1‐year mortality and impact of bivalirudin therapy according to level of baseline risk: A patient‐level pooled analysis from three randomized trials

OBJECTIVES: We aimed to construct a predictive model for one-year mortality in patients undergoing invasive coronary evaluation and to examine the impact of bivalirudin on survival according to the level of baseline risk. BACKGROUND: Compared to heparin plus GP IIb/IIIa inhibitors (HEP/GPI), bivalirudin decreases bleeding complications in a range of clinical presentations. The impact of preprocedural risk assessment on survival and whether this is modified by bivalirudin, has not been investigated in detail. METHODS: We examined patient-level data from the REPLACE-2, ACUITY, and HORIZONS-AMI trials (n = 18,819) to construct a risk-adjusted mortality model using baseline clinical variables. RESULTS: One-year mortality occurred in 287 patients (3.1%) assigned to bivalirudin and 336 patients (3.6%) assigned to HEP/GPI (HR 0.85; 95% CI, 0.73-1.00; P = 0.048). Using 11 highly significant predictors of mortality, we developed an integer-risk score to classify patients into risk tertiles. High-risk patients had a rate of 1-year mortality over 9-fold greater than low-risk patients. Consequently, the absolute mortality reduction attributed to bivalirudin was more marked in high-risk patients: 3.1% (-0.8% to 7.0%) in the overall cohort, 4.8% (0.5% to 9.2%) in the PCI cohort (P-interaction versus intermediate and low risk categories, 0.09 and P = 0.02, respectively). CONCLUSIONS: In patients undergoing invasive coronary evaluation, 1-year mortality can be predicted using baseline variables. Bivalirudin treatment (versus HEP/GPI) conferred a survival benefit.