Angiography-derived FFR reduces perioperative events in CABG for valve surgery patientsCould a New Heart Surgery Approach Save Lives for Patients with Valve Issues?

BACKGROUND: For patients undergoing surgical valve procedures with concomitant coronary artery disease, current guidelines recommend that coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) should be anatomically guided on the basis of stenosis severity, as assessed by coronary angiography. We aimed to test whether a physiologically guided strategy using angiography-derived fractional flow reserve (FFR) could improve clinical outcomes in this population. METHODS: FAVOR IV-QVAS is an investigator-initiated, multicentre, randomised, triple-blind trial done at 12 tertiary hospitals in China. Eligible patients were aged 18 years or older and were scheduled for valve surgery, with at least one clinically significant stenosis in a major coronary artery. Patients were randomly assigned (1:1) to undergo physiologically guided CABG (for lesions with an angiography-derived FFR value ≤0·80) or anatomically guided CABG (for lesions with a stenosis diameter ≥50% on coronary angiography). Randomisation was done using a web-based program and stratified by site with fixed blocks of four. Patients, surgeons, follow-up physicians, and outcome assessors were masked to treatment allocation. The primary outcome was a composite of death, myocardial infarction, stroke, unplanned coronary revascularisation, and new renal failure requiring dialysis within 30 days after surgery. The key secondary outcome was a composite of death, myocardial infarction, stroke, unplanned coronary revascularisation, and hospitalisation for unstable angina or heart failure at a minimum follow-up of 1 year. The primary analysis of the primary and key secondary outcomes was done in a modified intention-to-treat population that included all randomly assigned patients who underwent surgery and had available data for the primary outcome. Missing data for the primary outcome were planned to be analysed using complete-case analysis or multiple imputation, with a proportion of missing data of 2% as the threshold. This trial is registered at ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT03977129); extended follow-up is ongoing. FINDINGS: Between Aug 4, 2019, and Aug 13, 2024, 793 patients were enrolled. 396 were randomly assigned to the angiography-derived FFR group and 397 to the coronary angiography group; one patient in the coronary angiography group declined surgery and was excluded from the modified intention-to-treat population. The median age was 65 years (IQR 59-70), 221 (28%) patients were female, and 571 (72%) were male. Concomitant CABG was done in 223 (56%) patients in the angiography-derived FFR group and in 388 (98%) patients in the coronary angiography group. The primary outcome occurred in 31 (7·8%) patients in the angiography-derived FFR group and 53 (13·4%) in the coronary angiography group (absolute difference -5·6 percentage points [95% CI -9·9 to -1·3]; risk ratio 0·58 [95% CI 0·38 to 0·89]; p=0·011). Death within 30 days occurred in 11 (2·8%) patients in the angiography-derived FFR group and 17 (4·3%) patients in the coronary angiography group. At a median follow-up of 27 months (28 months [IQR 18-44] in the angiography-derived FFR group and 27 months [18-42] in the coronary angiography group), the key secondary outcome occurred in 82 (20·7%) patients in the angiography-derived FFR group and in 106 (26·8%) patients in the coronary angiography group (hazard ratio 0·74 [95% CI 0·55-0·98]; p=0·036). INTERPRETATION: Among patients undergoing valve surgery with concomitant coronary artery disease, physiologically guided CABG using angiography-derived FFR reduced the incidence of the composite perioperative outcome compared with anatomically guided CABG. These findings support a selective approach to surgical coronary revascularisation guided by physiological assessment in patients undergoing valve procedures. FUNDING: Shanghai Hospital Development Center, Shanghai Municipal Science and Technology Commission, and Ministry of Science and Technology of the People's Republic of China.