How safe is an angioplasty, and what are the main risks of having an angiogram and angioplasty in Singapore?

Doctor's Answer

Both angiogram and angioplasty procedures are quite safe in this day and age.

But any invasive procedure does carry a small risk. Some of the major risks of the procedure would be risk of heart attack (0.05%), stroke (0.07%), need for emergency cardiac surgery (0.05 to 0.3%) and mortality (0.08 to 0.65%). Bleeding and damage to the artery where we access is between 0.2 to 1%.

To place the above risk in context, I encourage people to compare angiography risk with the statistical risk of an accident on the roads (here in Singapore is 2.5 fatalities/100000 people in 2016).

Do bear in mind that risk is individualized for each patient and these numbers above are derived from statistical calculations from a large number of procedures over the years.

In practice however, over the last 17 years (I entered cardiology sometime in 2001 in the UK) spent in different parts of the UK and in Singapore I can recall two patients who had mini strokes, no patient undergoing emergency surgery and two patients who passed away (who were both quite ill) during emergency procedures. I do not recall any mortality for any patient undergoing elective procedures.

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