PURPOSE To evaluate the safety and efficacy of glycoprotein IIb/IIIa inhibitors (GPIs) in patients with acute myocardial infarction (AMI) in the presence of intracoronary thrombus undergoing percutaneous coronary interventions.

METHODS This study, performed from January 1, 2004, to November 31, 2014, at 55 centers in Korea, was based on the Grand Drug-Eluting Stent registry, which is a Korean, nationwide, multicenter, pooled registry of drug-eluting stents. The registry enrolled all-comers without any exclusion criteria except patient withdrawal of consent. A total of 1329 patients with AMI who had an overt intracoronary thrombus at the initial coronary angiography were analyzed. The efficacy end point was a 1-year major adverse cardiovascular event, defined as a composite of all death, myocardial infarction, target lesion revascularization, and stent thrombosis. The primary safety end point was any 30-day bleeding event.

FINDINGS GPIs were associated with a significantly higher rate of any bleeding events at 30 days (0.9% vs 2.9% in the non-GPI and GPI groups, respectively; P = 0.015), whereas GPI use was the only significant independent predictor of 30-day bleeding events by multivariable Cox proportional hazards regression analysis (hazard ratio = 4.76; 95% CI, 1.66-13.64; P = 0.004). Regarding the efficacy end points, no significant differences were noted according to GPI use (7.0% vs 9.0%, P = 0.287), and GPI use has no significant effect on 1-year major adverse cardiovascular events (hazard ratio = 1.33; 95% CI, 0.82-2.15; P = 0.253).

IMPLICATIONS Early upstream use of GPIs should not be considered even in the presence of an intracoronary thrombotic occlusion. ClinicalTrials.gov identifier: NCT03507205.