New studies are now showing the benefits...but then we come back to the over all cost as one of the stents coated with drugs costs about $2,000.00 more...great technology news but will someone pay the bill...hopefully decisions can be made quickly....BD
The more than ten million Americans who’ve received drug-eluting stents to open their blocked coronary arteries have a bright future, according to new research from the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine.
The findings, among the first large follow-up studies to show a clear, lifesaving benefit of drug-eluting stents compared to bare metal stents, will be published in the May 27 issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology. Patients with the drug-coated stents -- designed not only to open blocked coronary arteries but also to chemically inhibit future blockage -- were less apt to die, have heart attacks or require extra stents or bypass surgery in the two years following placement of the stent.
“This might be a hidden nugget of goodness that could not be detected in clinical trials,” says Peter W. Groeneveld, MD, MS, assistant professor in Penn’s Division of General Internal Medicine. “There is a distinct possibility that drug-eluting stents not only reduce the need for future cardiac procedures, but also save lives.”
More patients with drug-coated cardiac stents survive, avoid costly follow-up procedures
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