Background: In acute myocardial infarction, distal embolization of debris during primary percutaneous catheter intervention may curtail microvascular reperfusion of the infarct region. Our randomized trial investigated whether distal protection with a filter device can improve microvascular perfusion and reduce infarct size after primary percutaneous catheter intervention.
Methods and results: We enrolled 200 patients who had angina within 48 hours after onset of pain plus at least 1 of 3 additional criteria: ST-segment elevation, elevated myocardial marker proteins, and angiographic evidence of thrombotic occlusion. Among the patients included (83% men; mean age, 62+/-12 years), 100 were randomly assigned to the filter-wire group and 100 to the control group. The primary end point was the maximal adenosine-induced Doppler flow velocity in the recanalized infarct artery; the secondary end point was infarct size estimated by the volume of delayed enhancement on nuclear MRI. ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction was present in 68.5% of the patients; the median time from onset of pain was 6.9 hours. In the filter-wire group, maximal adenosine-induced flow velocity was 34+/-17 compared with 36+/-20 cm/s in the control group (P=0.46). Infarct sizes, assessed in 82 patients in the filter-wire group and 78 patients in the control group, were 11.8+/-9.3% of the left ventricular mass in the filter-wire group and 10.4+/-9.4% in the control group (P=0.33). Thirty-day mortality was 2% in filter-wire group and 3% in the control group.
Conclusions: The filter wire as an adjunct to primary percutaneous catheter intervention in myocardial infarction with and without ST-segment elevation did not improve reperfusion or reduce infarct size.