Impact of pre-procedural requirements on time to aortic valve replacement: Transcatheter AVR vs surgical AVR.

Background/objective: This study aims to understand the extent that cardiac specialist visits and imaging requirements contribute to the difference in time to Aortic valve replacement (AVR) stratified by approach transcatheter AVR (TAVR) and surgical AVR (SAVR). Methods: Optum Market Clarity Data was used to identify patients with clinically significant AS (CSAS) who received an AVR between 2016 and 2023 and whose AVR occurred within two years of their CSAS diagnosis. Patient characteristics were measured at baseline; pre-procedural factors, including the number of cardiac specialist visits and imaging events, were measured from CSAS diagnosis to AVR (TAVR vs SAVR). Stepwise generalized linear models were used to assess whether the number of cardiac specialist visits and imaging events contribute to the differences in time to TAVR and SAVR, after adjusting for baseline characteristics. Results: Of the 14,225 patients in the cohort, 42 % received a TAVR. Compared to the SAVR cohort, the TAVR cohort was, on average, more male, older, sicker, and had more Medicare enrollees. TAVR patients had approximately two times more cardiac specialist visits (3.73 vs 6.37) and imaging events (1.18 vs 2.07) than SAVR patients. Time to TAVR is 65 days longer (RR = 1.77, 1.67-1.87) than SAVR, after adjustment for patient characteristics. This difference reduces to 11 days (RR = 1.12, 1.07-1.17) after accounting cardiac specialist encounters and imaging events. Discussion: Pre-procedural encounters significantly contribute to the longer time to AVR for TAVR patients. Findings suggest a need for streamlining the pre-procedural process for TAVR to enhance timely care delivery for CSAS patients.