One-year clinical follow-up with the serpentine balloon expandable stent: report of the first 100 patients.
BACKGROUND
We recently reported a high technical and 30-day clinical success rate among the first 100 patients treated with the tubular, serpentine design, stainless steel, balloon-expandable stent (beStent) in Israel. The present study examined the clinical results in these patients after the first year.


METHODS
Seventy-eight men and 22 women were included in the study. Previous myocardial infarction, bypass surgery and percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty had occurred in 52%, 12% and 26% of the patients, respectively. Diabetes mellitus was present in 30 patients and hypertension in 34 patients. One hundred and forty-eight stents of 15, 25, and 35 mm lengths were used. The indications for stenting were suboptimal results (n = 85), bailout conditions (n = 10) or for the prevention of restenosis (n = 8), and lesion types were A (n = 10), B1 (n = 29), B2 (n = 20), and C (n = 44). All patients were clinically monitored with regular visits at 1, 3, 6, 9 and 12 months.


RESULTS
Overall, the 12-month event-free survival rate was 82%. Subacute thrombosis occurred in two patients. There were two non-cardiac deaths, one O-wave myocardial infarction, six elective bypass surgeries and 12 target lesion revascularizations. Event-free survival was significantly higher for those with lesions shorter than 15 mm than for those with lesions longer than 15 mm (90% versus 67%, P = 0.003), and for women compared with men (96% versus 78%, P = 0.02).


CONCLUSIONS
The initial experience with the beStent shows favorable long-term results with an overall event rate of 18% for this subset of relatively complex lesions; higher event rates were observed for longer lesions.
Roguin
A
A
Division of Invasive Cardiology, Rambam Medical Center, Haifa, Israel.
Gruberg
L
L
Markiewicz
W
W
Grenadier
E
E
Peled
B
B
Hir
J
J
Linn
S
S
Eisen
I
I
Beyar
R
R
D015906:Angioplasty, Balloon, Coronary / Q000295:instrumentation*; D001672:Biocompatible Materials; D017023:Coronary Angiography; D003327:Coronary Disease / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000401:mortality / Q000628:therapy*; D018572:Disease-Free Survival; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D019919:Prosthesis Implantation; D012008:Recurrence; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D013193:Stainless Steel; D015607:Stents; D015996:Survival Rate; D016896:Treatment Outcome
D001672:Biocompatible Materials; D013193:Stainless Steel