ABSTRACT
CLINICAL RELEVANCE OF CONTRAST NEPHROPATHY IN PRIMARY PCI Primary percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) represents the best available strategy for treatment of ST-segment elevation acute myocardial infarction (STEMI) (1). Patients who are having primary PCI, however, are at higher risk of contrast-induced nephropathy (CIN) than those undergoing elective PCI, although most of them do not have preprocedural renal dysfunction (2). Contrast-induced nephropathy is an acute decline in renal function occurring 48 to 72 hours after the systemic administration of contrast medium. It is usually defined by an absolute rise of at least 0.5 mg/dL in serum creatinine or by a relative increase of at least 25% over the baseline value (3).
