OBJECTIVES: Percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty (PTCA) is among the technologies available to restore blood flow in coronary arteries, being the preferred choice for myocardial reperfusion in acute syndromes. The objective is to describe procedure and in-hospital mortality rates trends of PTCA performed in Brazilian Public Healthcare System (SUS).

METHODS: Hospital admission records from 2014 to 2022 reporting PTCA procedures were obtained from the SUS’ Hospital Information System. Annual procedure and in-hospital mortality rates per 100,000 population were age and sex standardized by the Revised European Standard Population. Average percent change (APC) with 95% confidence interval (CI) was estimated by linear regression of the standardized rate logarithm. All analysis were performed using R.

RESULTS: In the period, 779,405 PTCA were registered in SUS, with 21,729 in-hospital deaths. The average annual PTCA procedure rate was 57.6/100,000 (single-stent: 19.9/100,000, double-stent: 30.6/100,000, primary: 6.3/100,000, unspecified: 2.2/100,000). Procedure rates slightly increased in the period (APC 1.4%, 95%CI 0.8 to 2.7%), derived from an increase in primary PTCA (APC 5.3%, 95%CI 3.2 to 7.5%) and single-stent (APC 3.9%, 95%CI 1.8 to 6.1%). Average annual in-hospital mortality rate was 1.9/100,000 (single-stent: 0.66/100,000, double-stent: 0.56/100,000, primary: 0.46/100,000, unspecified: 0.7/100,000), also with an annual increase in the period (APC 2.5%, 95%CI 1.2 to 3.7%), observed in primary PTCA (APC 4.1%, 95%CI 1.5 to 6.7%) and single-stent (APC 3.7%, 95%CI 1.1 to 6.2%).

CONCLUSIONS: There was an increase of the annual PTCA procedures performed in SUS from 2014 to 2022. Single-stent implants and primary PTCA showed higher annual rate rise. PTCA annual in-hospital mortality rate increase surpassed the one for PTCA procedure rate. Even though, for single-stent and primary PTCA the increase in in-hospital mortality was lower than the procedure rate. This analysis may indicate the need for closer surveillance of the PTCA outcomes in the SUS.