Angiography or Angioplasty, and What Each Costs

Angiography is a test: dye and X-ray pictures show whether the heart arteries are blocked. Angioplasty is the treatment: a balloon and a stent open the blocked artery. What each costs in Pakistan depends on the hospital, the stent, and any government cover, so ask for current prices at your consultation.

What is the difference between angiography and angioplasty?

The shortest way to hold it in your head: angiography looks, angioplasty fixes. Both are done in the same catheterisation lab, through the same small puncture at the wrist or groin, which is exactly why patients mix them up. They answer different questions and they carry very different price tags.

If angiography finds a severe blockage, angioplasty is often done in the same sitting, so the two can happen in one visit. Full details of each are on our angiography and angioplasty and stenting pages.

What happens during an angiography?

A thin flexible tube called a catheter is passed from the wrist or groin up to the heart, dye is injected into the heart arteries, and X-ray video shows where blood flows freely and where it does not. The test usually takes under an hour, and you are awake for all of it.

The skin is numbed first, so what you feel is pressure rather than pain. When the dye goes in, many patients feel a warm flush move through the body. That is normal and it passes in seconds. Afterwards the tube comes out and a tight band or dressing presses on the puncture site. With the wrist route, most patients are sitting up soon after and home the same day.

Angiography remains the most accurate way to map the heart arteries. European Society of Cardiology guidelines place coronary angiography at the centre of decision-making for patients with significant symptoms or abnormal test results, because the pictures decide what happens next: medicines alone, angioplasty, or bypass surgery.

What happens during an angioplasty and stenting?

Angioplasty starts exactly like angiography. The difference comes when the wire reaches the blockage. A small balloon is inflated to press the fatty deposit against the artery wall, and a stent, a tiny metal mesh tube, is left behind to hold the artery open. Blood flow to the heart muscle returns immediately.

The stent stays in your artery permanently and becomes part of the vessel wall over time. Afterwards, blood-thinning medicines are essential to stop clots forming inside the new stent. Stopping those medicines early is one of the most dangerous things a stent patient can do, so never stop them without asking your cardiologist first. The American Heart Association describes angioplasty as a common, well-established procedure. During an ongoing heart attack it is emergency treatment; for stable angina it is planned in advance.

What decides the cost of angiography and angioplasty in Pakistan?

There is no national price list for either procedure. The total depends on where it is done, what hardware goes in, and what support you qualify for. Rather than quote figures that go stale within months, it is more useful to understand the five things that actually move the bill.

Public versus private hospital

Public sector and teaching hospitals generally cost less, and government-supported patients may pay very little, though waiting lists can be longer. Private hospitals charge packaged rates covering the cath lab, staff and room, and those packages differ noticeably between hospitals in the same city.

Bare metal versus drug-eluting stent

The stent is usually the largest single item on an angioplasty bill. A bare metal stent is a plain mesh tube. A drug-eluting stent carries a medicine coating that slows re-narrowing, and it costs more. Most patients today receive drug-eluting stents, and prices vary between brands as well.

Number of stents and complexity

One artery and one stent is the simplest case. Two or three blockages mean more stents, more balloons and wires, more time in the lab and sometimes a longer stay. Very hard, calcium-loaded blockages may need special equipment, which adds more again.

Government programs such as the Sehat Card

Government health coverage, including the Sehat Card program, has paid for cardiac procedures at approved hospitals for eligible families. This changes what a patient actually pays more than any other factor on this list. Rules, empanelled hospital lists and limits shift over time, so bring your card and CNIC to your consultation and ask what applies to you right now.

Medicines, tests and follow-up

The bill does not stop at discharge. Blood thinners and other heart medicines continue for months or years, and follow-up visits and occasional tests are part of doing this properly. Ask for the full picture rather than the procedure price alone, so your family can plan honestly.

Package prices vary between hospitals and change over time, so we do not publish figures here. Ask for current prices during your consultation and we will explain the options for your specific case. For the exact current price, book an appointment or call the clinic and the team will confirm it before you commit to anything.

How do you decide which one you need?

You do not pick between angiography and angioplasty the way you pick between two shops. The test is what tells you whether the treatment is needed. Symptoms and non-invasive tests come first, angiography maps the arteries, and only then does the choice between medicines, stents and bypass surgery get made.

NICE guidance follows the same stepwise logic for assessing chest pain and treating coronary disease, matching investigations to the patient rather than running everything on everyone. Dr. Muhammad Ali Khan, Consultant Cardiologist in Abbottabad, walks patients through each of those steps: whether angiography is genuinely needed, what the pictures show, which stent makes sense, and whether the Sehat Card or another program can carry part of the cost. Bring your old reports, your medicine list and your questions. An unhurried explanation is part of the treatment, not an extra.

If you or someone in your family has been advised angiography or angioplasty and you want the difference, the process and the cost explained for your own case, book a consultation through our appointments page. A clinic visit costs Rs. 2,000 and an online video consultation costs Rs. 2,500.