This study assessed the Ultra-thin Strut Bioresorbable Polymer-based Coronary DES (Supraflex) against the Xience, with special emphasis in the cost-benefit ratio. It included a population of 1435 all-comers from 23 centers in 7 European countries, randomized 1:1 (720 Supraflex and 715 Xience). Primary end point was a composite of cardiac death, target vessel myocardial...
Polymer persistence in 1st and 2nd generation DES meant to allow drug release has been associated with a chronic inflammatory response that might be associated to restenosis, neo atherosclerosis and stent thrombosis. This is the rationale behind the development of polymer free and bioresorbable polymer-based DES. They have both been compared against permanent polymer DES,...
This study was aimed at gaining device registration from the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for a polymer-free biolimus A9 drug-coated stent (BioFreedom, Biosensors). The study had two purposes: on the one hand, it meant to reproduce the results of the LEADERS FREE trial (published in 2015) in terms of safety and efficacy with...
The IMPERIAL trial compared the safety and efficacy of a nitinol self-expanding polymer-free placlitaxel-eluting stent (Zilver PTX, Cook Medical, already approved by the US Food and Drug Administration [FDA]) and a nitinol self-expanding polymer-coating placlitaxel-eluting stent (Eluvia, Boston Scientific). This was a single-blind randomized trial in patients with symptomatic intermittent claudication (Rutherford categories 2, 3, or...
Successful rechanneling of a chronic total occlusion (currently around 90%) leads to significant improvement in quality of life and symptom frequency in patients with stable chronic angina compared with optimal medical treatment alone. These results are promising and what we ultimately expected, although symptoms, as a primary endpoint in themselves, are in the eye of...
Repeat revascularization rate has historically been the weak spot of PCI when compared against CABG: we are still unable to compete with a well done internal mammary artery graft connected to the anterior descending artery. However, repeat revascularization is the soft of end points commonly assessed in trials, and even though several studies have shown...
We have the pleasure to announce SOLACI will be taking part in the Annual Meeting of the Guatemalan Cardiology Association with a joint symposium chaired by doctors Alfaro Marchena Noriega (Panama) and Francisco Somoza (Honduras). The event will be held on Thursday the 4th of October 2018, from 3 to 5:30 pm, at Camino...
This condition, now “trending” among patients undergoing transcatheter aortic valve replacement (TAVR), has expanded to almost all patients we treat, always with the same outcome: the prognosis is bad, so bad that it might warrant making the difficult decision of not going forward. The association between frailty and bad prognosis is easy to see and...
Defining dual antiplatelet therapy (DAPT) seems a never-ending story. We go from trials showing the safety of shorter schemes thanks to new generation stents to others suggesting up to two years of DAPT. Rather than finding a general scheme, it seems to be about adjusting DAPT on a case by case basis, according to ischemia...
Published 5-year results had been neutral for bilateral vs. single internal-thoracic artery grafts, but, at the time, surgeons argued that the time period analyzed was not enough and that a difference would be observed after 10 years of follow-up, once the trial finished. Such follow-up was presented at the European Society of Cardiology (ESC) Congress 2018...