Plasma random glucose levels at hospital admission predicting worse outcomes in STEMI patients undergoing PCI: A case series

BACKGROUND: The effects of impaired plasma glucose levels on predicting clinical outcomes and in-hospital events in patients with ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) is unknown. Therefore, we evaluated random blood glucose at admission and its association with clinical outcomes in STEMI patients treated with PCI. METHODS: Patients with STEMI undergoing PCI were enrolled and were divided into 4 tertiles according to random blood glucose levels. Tertile 1 had levels below 100 mg/dL, tertile 2 had 100–200 mg/dL, tertile 3 had 200–300 mg/dL, and tertile 4 had random blood glucose levels >300 mg/dL. The cumulative rates of in-hospital mortality and major adverse cardiovascular events were calculated. RESULTS: Both the incidence of all-cause deaths and cumulative rates of major adverse cardiovascular events were significantly the lowest in patients within tertile 1. The cumulative incidence of in-hospital events was 14.3% in tertile 1, 17.6% in tertile 2, 23.5% in tertile 3, and 30.8% in tertile 4. The odds ratio of major adverse cardiovascular events was 1.286 [0.397–4.161] in tertile 2, 1.846 [0.492–6.927] in tertile 3, and 2.667 [0.693–10.254] in tertile 4. The cumulative proportion of adverse events was seen higher in tertile 4 on Kaplan-Meier log-rank (chi-square: 8.094, p = 0.044). CONCLUSION: Poor glycemic control or stress hyperglycemia on admission experienced the highest rates of major adverse cardiovascular events including deaths. Plasma random glucose was predictive of a worse prognosis for STEMI patients undergoing PCI in our study.