St Jude Medical has announced that an analysis of the benefits of Fractional Flow Reserve (FFR)-guided intervention has found to improve health outcomes while saving money.
The analysis, which used St Jude’s PressureWire Certus FFR technology, found that within each country’s health systems, using FFR saved money.
The randomised, prospective, multi-centre 12-month trial, which enrolled 1,005 patients, compared outcomes for patients whose treatment was guided by FFR to those whose treatment was guided only by angiography using the PressureWire Certus technology.
St Jude Medical cardiovascular and ablation technologies division president Frank Callaghan said results in both the US and now in Europe have demonstrated that FFR both improves patient outcomes and reduces cost to the healthcare system.
"With healthcare system finances under pressure everywhere, we are proud to offer a technology that relieves European health care systems from financial pressure and that protects and saves the lives of European patients," Callaghan said.
In addition, the use of the technology in the UK has shown to improve the quality-adjusted life expectancy and reduce treatment cost for PCI patients.
Health and Life Sciences University of Hall spokesperson Professor Uwe Siebert said in each region where the economic analysis was conducted, the PressureWire was found to both improve clinical outcomes by increasing quality-adjusted life years and reducing the number of cardiac events and save a substantial amount of resources.
"Our research reveals that the magnitude of the health benefits and cost savings from FFR measurement for the European patients and health care payers could be even more significant under an optimal FFR implementation scenario," Siebert said.
