External validation of the PRECISE-DAPT score in an Asian cohort of patients with acute coronary syndrome post-percutaneous coronary intervention
Authors: Fong R Y , Lee A , Huang W , Yeo K K ,   SingCLOUD Governance Committee
Published: October 2021

Abstract

Background
Dual antiplatelet therapy (DAPT) is a key treatment in acute coronary syndrome (ACS) patients after percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), and the PRECISE-DAPT score is one of the risk assessment tools developed to guide its optimal duration. However, the PRECISE-DAPT derivation cohorts were largely based on Western populations and it remains unclear whether the score is able to demonstrate good predictive value in Asian populations.

Objective
To validate the performance of the PRECISE-DAPT score in a nationwide Asian cohort of ACS patients who underwent PCI and with subsequent DAPT.

Methods
Patients admitted with ACS between January 2012 and December 2014 were extracted from the Singapore Cardiac Longitudinal Outcomes Database (SingCLOUD). The primary outcome was major adverse cardiovascular events (MACE), a composite of deaths, ischemic and hemorrhagic strokes, and recurrent myocardial infarction. The PRECISE-DAPT score was calculated for each patient and was used to stratify patients into low bleeding risk (LBR) (score &lt;25) and high bleeding risk (HBR) (score ≥25) groups (Figure 1). The PRECISE-DAPT guidelines propose that patients with LBR follow a DAPT regimen of 12 months, while patients with HBR follow a DAPT regimen of 3 months followed by aspirin or clopidogrel monotherapy for the rest of the year. Medication adherence to the PRECISE-DAPT guidelines with a proportion of days covered (PDC) of 80% over the 1-year period post-PCI was taken as the cutoff to define adherence, i.e. patients with at least 80% of days covered were defined as adherent. Multivariate Cox regression analysis adjusted for age, gender, ethnicity, smoking status, prior MI, prior PCI and diabetes mellitus was applied to examine the association between the PRECISE-DAPT adherence and MACE. Score discrimination using c-statistic were calculated and calibration curves were visually assessed.

Results
A total of 1135 patients were analyzed. The PRECISE-DAPT score of the adherent group (n=486) was lower compared to the non-adherent group, that made up the majority (n=649) [16.8 (± 9.63) vs 30.37 (± 18.4), p&lt;0.001]. The overall incidence rate of MACE in this cohort was 14.3% and bleeding rate was 1.5%. Non-adherence to PRECISE-DAPT guidelines was independently associated with MACE at 1 year [OR 1.48, 95% CI 1.03 – 2.13, p=0.033] (Figure 1). Receiver-operating characteristic (ROC) analysis demonstrated that the PRECISE-DAPT score in predicting MACE has an area under curve (AUC) of 0.644 [95% CI 0.603, 0.685] (Figure 2) with a sensitivity of 42.8% and specificity of 80.2%.

Conclusion
The PRECISE-DAPT score is able to predict MACE in Asian patients with ACS treated with PCI with high specificity but is not sensitive. The lower AUC value derived suggests that other important factors potentially contribute to the development of MACE in this cohort. Further research is warranted to identify factors that may improve its discriminative performance.

Funding Acknowledgement
Type of funding sources: Public grant(s) – National budget only. Main funding source(s): National Medical Research Council (NMRC) Figure 1. Cox regression for MACEFigure 2. Histogram and AUC Curve