Time-to-operation does not predict outcome in acute type A aortic dissection complicated by neurologic injury at presentation.

Objective: Neurologic injury complicating the presentation of acute type A aortic dissection remains a challenge for cardiac surgeons.

Methods: This was a retrospective review of patients undergoing open repair of acute type A aortic dissection at our institution between January 2005 and December 2015. Evidence of neurologic injury at the time of presentation was abstracted from the medical record. Propensity-score matching was used to account for baseline differences between groups, and outcome analysis was performed using logistic regression and Kaplan-Meier analysis. Among patients with persistent neurologic deficits, a threshold for time-to-operation was evaluated using receiver operating characteristic curves.

Results: There were 345 patients who underwent open repair for acute type A aortic dissection; 50 patients presented with neurologic injury. In the matched analysis, in-hospital mortality was greater among patients who presented with neurologic deficits (odds ratio, 4.42; 95% confidence interval, 1.15-16.97; P = .03). Among patients with persistent neurologic deficits at presentation, receiver operating characteristic curve analysis with cross-validation suggested that time-to-operation was a poor predictor of both neurologic outcome (area under the curve, 0.40) and death (area under the curve, 0.49).

Conclusions: Neurologic injury at the time of presentation with acute type A aortic dissection was associated with an increased risk of in-hospital mortality. Among patients with persistent neurological deficits, time-to-operation failed to predict either neurologic outcome or perioperative mortality suggesting that longer time from onset of symptoms of neurologic injury should not act as a contraindication to proceeding to the operating room for expedient repair.