Clinical Characteristics and Outcomes Among Patients Undergoing High‐Risk Percutaneous Coronary Interventions by Single or Multiple Operators: Insights From the Veterans Affairs Clinical Assessment, Reporting, and Tracking Program

Background High‐risk percutaneous coronary intervention (HR‐PCI) is increasingly common among contemporary patients with coronary artery disease. Experts have advocated for a collaborative 2‐operator approach to support intraprocedural decision‐making for these complex interventions. The impact of a second operator on patient and procedural outcomes is unknown. Methods and Results Patients who underwent HR‐PCI from 2015 to 2018 within the Veterans Affairs Healthcare System were identified. Propensity‐matched cohorts were generated to compare the outcomes following HR‐PCI performed by a single or multiple (≥2) operators. The primary end point was the 12‐month rate of major adverse cardiovascular events. We identified 6672 patients who underwent HR‐PCI during the study period; 6211 (93%) were treated by a single operator, and 461 (7%) were treated by multiple operators, with a nonsignificant trend toward increased multioperator procedures over time. A higher proportion of patients treated by multiple operators underwent left main (10% versus 7%, P =0.045) or chronic total occlusion intervention (11% versus 5%, P <0.001). Lead interventionalists participating in multioperator procedures practiced at centers with higher annual HR‐PCI volumes (124±71.3 versus 111±69.2; standardized mean difference, 0.197; P <0.001) but otherwise performed a similar number of HR‐PCI procedures per year (34.4±35.3 versus 34.7±30.7; standardized mean difference, 0.388; P =0.841) compared with their peers performing single‐operator interventions. In a propensity‐matched cohort, there was no significant difference in major adverse cardiovascular events (32% versus 30%, P =0.444) between patients who underwent single‐operator versus multioperator HR‐PCI. Adjusted analyses accounting for site‐level variance showed no significant differences in outcomes. Conclusions Patients who underwent multioperator HR‐PCI had similar outcomes compared with single‐operator procedures. Further studies are needed to determine if the addition of a second operator offers clinical benefits to a subset of HR‐PCI patients undergoing left main or chronic total occlusion intervention.