Racial Differences in Quality of Care and Outcomes After Acute Coronary Syndrome

Guideline adherence and variation in acute coronary syndrome (ACS) outcomes by race in the modern era of drug-eluting stents (DES) are not well understood. Previous studies also fail to capture rapidly growing minority populations, such as Asians. A retrospective analysis of 689,238 hospitalizations for ACS across all insurance types from 2008 to 2011 from the Healthcare Cost and Utilization Project database was performed to determine whether quality of ACS care and mortality differ by race (white, black, Asian, Hispanic, or Native American), with adjustment for patient clinical and demographic characteristics and clustering by hospital. We found that black patients had the lowest in-hospital mortality rates (5% vs 6% to 7% for other races, p <0.0001, odds ratio [OR] 1.02, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.97 to 1.07), despite low rates of timely angiography in ST elevation myocardial infarction and non-ST-elevation myocardial infarction, and lower use of DES (30% vs 38% to 40% for other races, p <0.0001). In contrast, Asian patients had the highest in-hospital mortality rates (7% vs 5% to 7% for other races, p <0.0001, odds ratio 1.13, 95% CI 1.08 to 1.20, relative to white patients), despite higher rates of timely angiography in ST-elevation myocardial infarction and non ST-elevation myocardial infarction, and the highest use of DES (74% vs 63% to 68% for other races, p <0.0001). Asian patients had the worst in-hospital mortality outcomes after ACS, despite high use of early invasive treatments. Black patients had better in-hospital outcomes despite receiving less guideline-driven care. Published by Elsevier Inc.