Courtesy of Dr. Carlos Fava. Nowadays, peripheral interventions are on the rise and the technological development of stents and balloons would help achieve better outcomes. Both drug-eluting stents (DES) and drug-coated balloons (DCB) have proved to be beneficial for femoropopliteal interventions, but the actual role of each of these technologies remains unclear. This prospective, randomized 1:1...
Courtesy of Dr. Carlos Fava. One of the limitations to percutaneous interventions is poor or impossible femoral access. This happens especially in TAVR, with endoprosthesis or ventricular assistance devices, when the transcaval approach with cardiac occluder rises as a viable alternative. We have started to use it in TAVR, but at present there is little...
Aspirin is against the ropes: first, it was primary prevention; now, its use is being reconsidered even in relation to angioplasty. There might be paradigm changes as regards antiplatelet therapy after angioplasty. These two studies presented at the American College of Cardiology (ACC) 2019 Scientific Session can really change what we have been doing unquestioningly...
The rationale behind the decision to not add another layer of metal to the artery sounded attractive and this was what paved the way for drug coated balloons as an alternative strategy to treat in-stent restenosis. “We’ve already got a stent in place, we only have to dilate and leave the drug” is what we...
According to this new study, in patients with coronary disease, diabetes, and chronic kidney disease who underwent revascularization through angioplasty or surgery, events are similar. This is one of the first studies painting the real picture for the prognosis of patients revascularized in these conditions (diabetes plus chronic kidney disease). At first sight, these...
The number of centers that are starting endovascular stroke therapy (EST) to treat acute stroke is growing fast, with a significant increase of cases in low volume centers. Interventional neurologists are not able to cover the high demand and interventional cardiologists are always ready to learn something new. Is this right? Should interventional cardiologists treat...
The beneficial effect of low dose drug coated balloons with paclitaxel is sustained in time according to this randomized study. In a nutshell, this study has shown a significant statistical difference in favor of paclitaxel coated balloons vs. conventional PCI at 2 years. The safety and efficacy of new generation low dose drug coated balloons...
Up to 20% of patients undergoing left main PCI require a 2-stent technique, and this number should most likely grow after the DKCRUSH-V outcomes. However, this study contradicts the DKCRUSH-V and brings us back to “the simpler the better”, since patients undergoing 1 stent left main PCI presented less revascularization and less target vessel failure...
In diabetic patients with multivessel disease, anatomical complexity assessed by SYNTAX score is an independent predictor of combined events only por PCI patients, and has absolutely no consequence for surgery. The score should not be used to decide on a revascularization strategy. If the patient is diabetic and has multivessel disease, they simply ought to...
The use of endovascular aneurysm repair (EVAR) for the treatment of infrarenal abdominal aortic aneurysms is widely spread, due to its minimally invasive approach, rapid recovery, and better short-term survival. Approximately 60% of all infrarenal abdominal aortic aneurysms (AAAs) repairs in Europe and 85% in the United States are by EVAR. A decade ago, we believed...