European journal of cardio-thoracic surgery 61(4) Long-term survival after coronary bypass surgery with multiple versus single arterial grafts Key words: SYNTAX, coronary artery disease, revascularization, coronary artery bypass grafting, multiple arterial grafts, survival Thuijs, Daniel J.F.M. Davierwala, Piroze Deo, Salil V. Milojević, Milan Noack, Thilo Kappetein, A. Pieter Serruys, Patrick W. Mohr, Friedrich-Wilhelm Morice, Marie-Claude Mack, Michael J. Stahle, L. Elisabeth G.E. Verberkmoes, Niels J. Holmes Jr., David R. Head, Stuart J. OBJECTIVES: This study sought to evaluate the long-term differences in survival between multiple arterial grafts (MAG) and single arterial grafts (SAG) in patients who underwent coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) in the SYNTAX study. METHODS: The present analysis included the randomized and registry-treated CABG patients (n = 1509) from the SYNTAX Extended Survival study (SYNTAXES). Patients with only venous (n = 42) or synthetic grafts (n = 1) were excluded. The primary end point was all-cause death at the longest follow-up. Multivariable Cox regression was used to adjust for differences in baseline characteristics. Sensitivity analysis using propensity matching with inverse probability for treatment weights was performed. RESULTS: Of the 1466 included patients, 465 (31.7%) received MAG and 1001 (68.3%) SAG. Patients receiving MAG were younger and at lower risk. At the longest follow-up of 12.6 years, all-cause death occurred in 23.6% of MAG and 40.0% of SAG patients [adjusted hazard ratio (HR) 0.74, 95% confidence interval (CI) (0.55–0.98); P = 0.038], which was confirmed by sensitivity analysis. MAG in patients with the three-vessel disease was associated with significant lower unadjusted and adjusted all-cause death at 12.6 years [adjusted HR 0.65, 95% CI (0.44–0.97); P = 0.033]. In contrast, no significance was observed after risk adjustment in patients with the left main disease, with and without diabetes, or among SYNTAX score tertiles. CONCLUSIONS: In the present post hoc analysis of all-comers patients from the SYNTAX trial, MAG resulted in markedly lower all-cause death at 12.6-year follow-up compared to a SAG strategy. Hence, this striking long-term survival benefit of MAG over SAG encourages more extensive use of multiple arterial grafting in selected patients with reasonable life expectancy. Trial registration: SYNTAXES ClinicalTrials.gov reference: NCT03417050; SYNTAX ClinicalTrials.gov reference: NCT00114972. info:eu-repo/semantics/article All rights reserved https://unilib.phaidrabg.rs/o:3230 doi:10.1093/ejcts/ezab392 cobiss:128401673 ISSN: 1873-734X SYNTAX Extended Survival Investigators 2022 application/pdf 1604743 bytes eng