@article {Bluszteinemermed-2020-210522, author = {David Blusztein and Diem Dinh and Dion Stub and Luke Dawson and Angela Brennan and Christopher Reid and Karen Smith and Ziad Nehme and Emily Andrew and Stephen Bernard and Jeffrey Lefkovits}, title = {Predictors of hospital prenotification for STEMI and association of prenotification with outcomes}, elocation-id = {emermed-2020-210522}, year = {2021}, doi = {10.1136/emermed-2020-210522}, publisher = {British Association for Accident and Emergency Medicine}, abstract = {Background Delay to reperfusion in ST-elevation myocardial infarction (STEMI) is detrimental, but can be minimised with prehospital notification by ambulance to the treating hospital. We aimed to assess whether prenotification was associated with improved first medical contact to balloon times (FMC-BT) and whether this resulted in better clinical outcomes. We also aimed to identify factors associated with use of prenotification.Methods This was a retrospective study of prospective Victorian Cardiac Outcomes Registry data for patients undergoing primary percutaneous coronary intervention for STEMI from 2013-2018. Postcardiac arrest were excluded. Patients were grouped by whether they arrived by ambulance with prenotification (group 1), arrived by ambulance without prenotification (group 2) or self-presented (group 3). We compared groups by FMC-BT, incidence of major adverse cardiac and cerebrovascular events (MACCE), mortality and factors associated with the use of prenotification.Results 2891 patients were in group 1 (79.3\% male), 1620 in group 2 (75.7\% male) and 1220 in group 3 (82.9\% male). Patients who had prenotification were more likely to present in-hours (p=0.004) and self-presenters had lowest rates of cardiogenic shock (p\<0.001). Prenotification had shorter FMC-BT than without prenotification (104 min vs 132 min, p\<0.001) Self-presenters had superior clinical outcomes, with no difference between ambulance groups. Groups 1 and 2 had similar 30-day MACCE outcomes (7.4\% group 1 vs 9.1\% group 2, p=0.05) and similar mortality (4.6\% group 1 vs 5.9\% group 2, p=0.07). In multivariable analysis, male gender, right coronary artery culprit and in-hours presentation independently predicted use of prenotification (all p\<0.05).Conclusion Differences in clinical characteristics, particularly gender, time of presentation and culprit vessel may influence ambulance prenotification. Ambulance cohorts have high-risk features and worse outcomes compared with self-presenters. Improving system inequality in prehospital STEMI diagnosis is recommended for fastest STEMI treatment.Data are available on reasonable request. Data may be obtained from a third party and are not publicly available. Data are from the Victorian Cardiac Outcomes Registry (vcor@monash.edu), which gathers de-identified participant data with informed consent and opt-out required.}, issn = {1472-0205}, URL = {https://emj.bmj.com/content/early/2021/12/13/emermed-2020-210522}, eprint = {https://emj.bmj.com/content/early/2021/12/13/emermed-2020-210522.full.pdf}, journal = {Emergency Medicine Journal} }