title: [Interventional catheter treatment of bypass graft stenosis: comparison of intracoronary stent implantation and balloon angioplasty].
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  Balloon angioplasty of a stenosed bypass graft has a much higher risk of recurrent stenosis than dilatation of a stenosed native coronary artery. Intracoronary stent implantation has established itself as the better treatment of native coronary artery stenosis than conventional balloon angioplasty. However, there is still uncertainty whether intracoronary stent implantation in stenosed bypass vessels gives better long-term results than conventional balloon angioplasty.
  
  
  METHODS
  Results were retrospectively analyzed of unrandomized 224 primarily successful interventions--122 balloon dilatations and 102 stent implantations--performed between January 1996 and June 1998 on stenosed coronary bypass grafts, re-examined by coronary angiography an average of 6 months later. All but 11 patients were on combined aspirin and ticlopidine antiplatelet aggregation treatment.
  
  
  RESULTS
  There was a significantly lower 6-month restenosis rate (30.4%) after stent implantation than after balloon dilatation (51.6%). The re-intervention rate was also significantly lower after stent implantation.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These data suggest that stent implantation of stenosed coronary bypass grafts under cover of platelet-aggregation inhibition with aspirin and ticlopidine provides a lower restenosis and thus higher revascularization rate than conventional balloon dilatation.
authors.affiliation: Medizinische Klinik und Polyklinik B, Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf. Heidland@med.uni-duesseldorf.de
authors.forename: U E
authors.initials: UE
authors.lastname: Heidland
authors.forename: M P
authors.initials: MP
authors.lastname: Heintzen
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Schoppmann
authors.forename: C J
authors.initials: CJ
authors.lastname: Michel
authors.forename: B E
authors.initials: BE
authors.lastname: Strauer
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D015906:Angioplasty, Balloon, Coronary; D016001:Confidence Intervals; D017023:Coronary Angiography; D001026:Coronary Artery Bypass; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006083:Graft Occlusion, Vascular / Q000628:therapy*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009203:Myocardial Infarction / Q000453:epidemiology; D012008:Recurrence; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D015607:Stents