The impact of onset-to-cut time in surgery for stable acute type A aortic dissection-a single-centre retrospective cohort study

Objectives: The goal of this study was to investigate the impact of onset-to-cut time on mortality in patients undergoing surgery for stable acute type A aortic dissection.

Methods: Patients who underwent surgery for acute type A aortic dissection between January 2006 and December 2021 and available onset-to-cut times were included. Patients with unstable aortic dissection (preoperative shock, intubation, resuscitation, coma, pericardial tamponade and local/systemic malperfusion syndromes) were excluded. After descriptive analysis, a multivariable binary logistic regression for 30-day mortality was performed. A receiver operating characteristic curve for onset-to-cut time and 30-day mortality was calculated. Restricted cubic splines were designed to investigate the association between onset-to-cut time and survival.

Results: The final cohort comprised 362 patients. The median onset-to-cut time was 543 (376-1155) min. The 30-day mortality was 9%. Only previous myocardial infarction (P = 0.018) and prolonged cardiopulmonary bypass time (P < 0.001) were identified as independent risk factors for 30-day mortality. The corresponding area under the receiver operating characteristic curve showed a value of 0.49. Restricted cubic splines did not indicate an association between onset-to-cut time and survival (P = 0.316).

Conclusions: Onset-to-cut time in the setting of stable acute type A aortic dissection does not seem to be a valid predictor of 30-day mortality in patients undergoing surgery and stayed stable during the preoperative course.