ABSTRACT
Certain clinical and morphologic cardiac observations have been reported in at least 9 patients who died within 30 days of percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty (PTCA) for angina pectoris. Of the remaining 6 patients, 4 had immediately recognizable complications of the PTCA procedure, and each of them either immediately or the next day had coronary artery bypass grafting. The remaining 2 reported patients who had PTCA for angina pectoris died 5 and 30 days, respectively, after the PTCA procedure, which was considered at the time uncomplicated, and the PTCA was followed by an asymptomatic period before sudden death. The present report focuses on morphologic cardiac findings in another patient who had PTCA for angina pectoris and died suddenly the next day after a presumably uncomplicated and 'successful' PTCA. P.D., a 67-year-old man, had the onset of exertional angina pectoris 26 months before death.
