Prognostic values of the SYNTAX score II and the erythrocyte sedimentation rate on long-term clinical outcomes in STEMI patients with multivessel disease: a retrospective cohort study

BACKGROUND: There is a paucity of evidence on the combination of the SYNTAX score II (SSII) and erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) in assessing the long-term prognosis of patients with ST-elevated myocardial infarction (STEMI) and multivessel disease. The objective of this study was to investigate whether the ESR could enhance the predictive value of SSII on the long-term prognosis of STEMI patients. METHODS: A retrospective cohort study involving 483 STEMI and multivessel disease subjects receiving primary percutaneous coronary intervention was conducted. Major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE) included cardiovascular death, acute heart failure, recurrent myocardial infarction, revascularization, and nonfatal stroke. The predicted values of different models were estimated by a likelihood ratio test, Akaike’s information criteria (AIC), receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves, net reclassification improvement (NRI), and integrated discrimination improvement (IDI). RESULTS: During the follow-up period of up to 52 months, both the SSII and ESR were independently associated with MACE (hazard ratio [HR] = 1.032, p < 0.001; and HR = 1.021, p < 0.001, respectively). The likelihood test indicated that ESR could improve the prognostic model containing SSII (p < 0.001), while the combined model of SSII and ESR attained a lower AIC (p < 0.001). The area under the ROC curve of the combined model containing SSII and ESR increased by 0.05 (p = 0.04) compared to that of the model with SSII alone. The net reclassification and integrated discrimination of the SSII alone model improved significantly with ESR (NRI = 0.0319, p < 0.001; IDI = 0.0334, p < 0.001). CONCLUSIONS: The prognostic model containing SSII, which is an independent risk factor of MACE, had a significantly enhanced predictive probability with the addition of ESR.