Clinical Characteristics and Prognosis of Young Patients with Coronary Heart Disease

BACKGROUND The objective of this study was to investigate the clinical characteristics and prognosis of coronary heart disease (CHD) in young patients. MATERIAL AND METHODS We included 972 CHD patients (≤50 years old) with coronary artery stenting who were prospectively enrolled and followed for 1 year. Clinical characteristics, risk factors, and predictors of outcomes were evaluated. RESULTS The prevalence of current smoker, hypertension, diabetes mellitus, dyslipidemia and positive family history of CHD were 18.9%, 34.3%, 14.5%, 4.4%, and 44.2%, respectively. Most of the patients underwent coronary stenting due to stable angina (48.8%) and unstable angina (UA; 48.1%). After 1-year follow-up, 64 patients (6.6%) experienced clinical outcomes and the most common event was UA (n=56). Compared to patients without clinical outcomes, those with outcomes were more likely to be male, have higher systolic blood pressure, more likely to have hypertension and diabetes mellitus, and more likely to be presented as unstable angina. Multivariate regression analysis showed only age (hazard ratio [HR]: 1.12 and 95% confidence interval [CI]: 1.07-1.26), smoking (HR: 1.15 and 95% CI: 1.06-1.23), presence of hypertension (HR: 1.19 and 95% CI: 1.13-1.31), and diabetes mellitus (HR: 1.16 and 95% CI: 1.09-1.28), more vessels with stenosis (HR: 1.27 and 95% CI: 1.20-1.48) and presented with acute coronary syndrome (HR: 1.35 and 95% CI: 1.21-1.55) were independently associated with clinical outcomes. CONCLUSIONS Most of the young (≤50 years of age) CHD patients had poor management of risk factors and better controlling these risk factors would be helpful for the primary and secondary prevention of premature CHD in Guangdong province.