Abstract 40: Should Bilateral Internal Thoracic Artery Grafting Be Used in Emergency Patients?

HYPOTHESIS: Bilateral Internal Thoracic Artery (BITA) grafting is not often used in emergency coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) due to questionable survival benefit ,relative complexity and increased risk of sternal infection compared to operations incorporating Single Internal Thoracic Artery (SITA). The purpose of this study is to compare early and long term outcome of emergent patients undergoing BITA grafting, to that of emergent patients undergoing CABG with SITA METHODS: Four hundred thirty eight emergency patients underwent BITA grafting between 1996 and 2008. They were compared with 339 emergency patients who underwent CABG with SITA RESULTS: Occurrence of female gender (18.5% vs. 29.5%, P< 0.001, in the BITA and SITA groups, respectively), diabetes (25.3% vs. 38.6%, P< 0.001), age 70+ (61.0% vs.39.7%, P< 0.001), chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (5.7% vs.13.9%, P< 0.001) EF <30% (12.1% vs. 17.1%, P< 0.001), and chronic renal failure (7.1% vs. 17.1%, p< 0.001) was lower in the BITA group....