The predictive value of the HEART and GRACE scores for major adverse cardiac events in patients with acute chest pain

Abstract

The history, electrocardiogram, age, risk factors, troponin (HEART) and global registry of acute coronary events (GRACE) scoring systems are commonly used to risk stratify patients with chest pain. This study investigated the application of these scores in predicting the short-term risk of a major adverse cardiac event (MACE) in patients with chest. A total of 509 patients were analyzed. All patients were followed up for 30 days after visiting our emergency department. At 30 days post-admission, the primary outcome (MACE) was recorded in 92 patients (18.1%), 88 (95.6%) of whom had experienced an acute myocardial infarction. Thirty-seven (40.2%) of the patients with a MACE underwent percutaneous coronary intervention and six patients (6.5%) died. The HEART and GRACE scores were both significantly higher in patients who developed a MACE than in those without (P < 0.05). The HEART and GRACE scores had c-statistic values of 0.811 (95% CI 0.774–0.844) and 0.648 (95% CI 0.603–0.688), respectively. The Hosmer–Lemeshow statistic revealed that the HEART and GRACE scores had values of 8.68 (P = 0.39) and 10.45 (P = 0.11), respectively. The percentages of patients with HEART scores of 0–3, 4–6, and 7–10 were 3.0%, 26.2%, and 46.3%, respectively, in those with a MACE within 30 days. The findings show that while both scoring systems are useful, the HEART score is superior to the GRACE score for predicting the occurrence of MACE within 30 days in patients with chest pain.