Angiographic pattern of in-stent restenosis (ISR) after drug-eluting stent (DES) implantation different to that after bare metal stent (BMS), but their subsequent TLR rate was similar to both types of DES.
Techniques for penetrating chronic total occlusion (CTO) to ensure complete revascularization using percutaneous coronary techniques. Success is only 50–75%, even in the best hands. How to improve?
We must optimize stent deployment & maintain a registry of how well (or poorly) we use drug-eluting stents. Instead of asking “Which stent?” or “How much anti-platelet therapy?” we must ask “How effectively are we deploying our stents?”
FDA says drug-eluting stents are safe & effective in stable patients with single-vessel disease; even so, they'll have to take Plavix (clopidogrel) & aspirin for a year or more...up to a lifetime. High-risk patients with multivessel disease are much more
An investigational bioabsorbable coronary artery stent, in its first human trials, showed acceptable safety, with efficacy better than bare-metal devices but well short of drug-eluting devices, Dutch researchers said here.
Articles on the various questions, problems, and controversies currently plaguing drug-eluting stents: deployment techniques, stent qualities, antiplatelet therapies, and etiologies of post-DES thrombosis and restenosis.
An investigational drug-eluting stent called Xience, coated with everolimus, led to significantly less late lumen loss after nine months than did the Taxus (paclitaxel-eluting) stent, said researchers here today. March 2007