Drug-Eluting Stents

-for Many a Far Less Invasive Option

Though coronary artery disease remains the leading cause of death in developed countries, new options for maintaining these tiny but critically important vessels are changing the landscape of cardiac care.

Traditionally, the most severe cases of coronary disease could only be treated with complex, invasive bypass procedures. Less invasive procedures such as angioplasty and stenting-in which balloons are utilized to compress open plaque and deliver stainless steel meshworks called stents-might be used for more straightforward blocked arteries.

With the advent of drug-eluting stents-stents coated with drugs that are slowly delivered to the arterial wall-these rules no longer apply.

"Coronary stenting procedures are now being performed increasingly in patients whose only previous options would have been open heart surgery," says Richard Zelman, MD, director of interventional cardiology at Cape Cod Healthcare.

Whereas balloon angioplasty has a 50 percent risk of the vessel renarrowing and bare stents a 30 percent risk, drug-eluting stents have only a 5 to 10 percent risk. Since March 2003, over 2,000 patients have received treatment with these devices at Cape Cod Hospital. Only a tiny fraction has required further treatment due to renarrowing. Dr. Zelman and the catheterization laboratories staff now routinely perform procedures on three or four blocked arteries at a time or even upon the heart muscle's main artery.

With four new state-of-the-art interventional cardiology suites opening at Cape Cod Hospital, along with the integrated diagnostic catheterization facility at Falmouth Hospital, these highly complex patients continue to have tremendously expanding options. Add to this the benefit derived from many unique clinical research trials- including two featuring second generation drug-eluting stents-and Cape Cod patients can rest assured their hearts are in the best hands.