Stick with the old ways, study shows
August 1, 1998 less than 1 minute read
Stick with the old ways, study shows
Except for stents, new catheter-based devices to open clogged arteries are no better than balloons, according to a recent study.1
The chief limitation of 20-year-old angioplasty has been the high rate of renarrowing within six months. A number of new technologies for coronary interventions have emerged over the decade that promise to remove or push aside atherosclerotic plaque using lasers or blades. Investigators compared the outcomes of patients who had undergone either angioplasty or the newer approaches and found no overall advantage for the new devices after one year.
Reference
1. King SB, Yeh W, Holubkov R, et al. Balloon angioplasty versus new device intervention. J Am Coll Cardiol 1998;31:558-566.
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