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Objectives: The authors sought to assess the association between admission time with patient's care, procedure characteristics, and clinical outcomes within a contemporary ST-segment elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) network of patients referred for primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI)., Background: The effect of admission time on STEMI patient's outcomes remains controversial when primary PCI is the preferred reperfusion strategy., Methods: Characteristics and clinical outcomes of 2,167 consecutive STEMI patients admitted in a tertiary PCI-capable center were collected. On-hours were defined as admission from Monday through Friday between 8 am and 6 pm and off-hours as admission during night shift, weekend, and nonworking holidays. In-hospital and 1-year all-cause mortality were assessed as well as key time delays., Results: A total of 1,048 patients (48.3%) were admitted during on-hours, and 1,119 patients (51.7%) during off-hours. Characteristics were well-balanced between the 2 groups, including rates of cardiac arrest (7.9% vs. 8.8%; p = 0.55) and cardiogenic shock (12.3% vs. 14.7%; p = 0.16). Median symptom-to-first medical contact time and median first medical contact-to-sheath insertion time did not differ according to on- versus off-hours admission (120 min vs. 126 min; p = 0.25 and 90 min vs. 93 min; p = 0.58, respectively), as well as the rate of radial access for catheterization (85.6% vs. 87.5%; p = 0.27). There was no association between on- versus off-hours groups and in-hospital (8.1% vs. 7.0%; p = 0.49) or 1-year mortality (11.0% vs. 11.1%; p = 0.89), respectively., Conclusions: In a contemporary organized STEMI network, patients admitted in a high-volume tertiary primary PCI center during on-hours or off-hours had similar management and 1-year outcomes., (Copyright © 2019 American College of Cardiology Foundation. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.)

Treatment of intracoronary thrombus is well documented. Three situations should be differentiated Primary percutaneous coronary intervention for early STEMI presenters is the most frequent one. Glycoprotein IIb/IIIa inhibitors are the gold standard antithrombotic treatment with a clear mortality benefit with abciximab. Thrombectomy with simple to use devices is another attractive option for interventionalists, although there is no clear established clinical benefit. Rescue PCI following failed thrombolysis is a more complicated situation given the underlying bleeding risk that is difficult to evaluate. The second situation is when a thrombus appears during an elective PCI. Although much less frequent than primary PCI, it is more often related to a lack of identification of the risk, to an inappropriate choice of the materials or to a non-optimal upstream antithrombotic treatment. A careful identification of all potential relevant causes is the key point of the management strategy. Post-PCI rethrombosis is the third situation and probably the less frequent. However, it is the most difficult to deal with.