• Takumi Inami, Masaharu Kataoka, Nobuhiko Shimura, Haruhisa Ishiguro, Ryoji Yanagisawa, Hiroki Taguchi, Keiichi Fukuda, Hideaki Yoshino, and Toru Satoh.
• Division of Cardiology, Second Department of Internal Medicine, Kyorin University School of Medicine, Tokyo, Japan.
• JACC Cardiovasc Interv. 2013 Jul 1;6(7):725-36.

ObjectivesThis study sought to identify useful predictors for hemodynamic improvement and risk of reperfusion pulmonary edema (RPE), a major complication of this procedure.BackgroundPercutaneous transluminal pulmonary angioplasty (PTPA) has been reported to be effective for the treatment of chronic thromboembolic pulmonary hypertension (CTEPH). PTPA has not been widespread because RPE has not been well predicted.MethodsWe included 140 consecutive procedures in 54 patients with CTEPH. The flow appearance of the target vessels was graded into 4 groups (Pulmonary Flow Grade), and we proposed PEPSI (Pulmonary Edema Predictive Scoring Index) = (sum total change of Pulmonary Flow Grade scores) × (baseline pulmonary vascular resistance). Correlations between occurrence of RPE and 11 variables, including hemodynamic parameters, number of target vessels, and PEPSI, were analyzed.ResultsHemodynamic parameters significantly improved after median observation period of 6.4 months, and the sum total changes in Pulmonary Flow Grade scores were significantly correlated with the improvement in hemodynamics. Multivariate analysis revealed that PEPSI was the strongest factor correlated with the occurrence of RPE (p < 0.0001). Receiver-operating characteristic curve analysis demonstrated PEPSI to be a useful marker of the risk of RPE (cutoff value 35.4, negative predictive value 92.3%).ConclusionsPulmonary Flow Grade score is useful in determining therapeutic efficacy, and PEPSI is highly supportive to reduce the risk of RPE after PTPA. Using these 2 indexes, PTPA could become a safe and common therapeutic strategy for CTEPH.Copyright © 2013 American College of Cardiology Foundation. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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