Stent Research: More Data, But What Does It Mean for You?

If you are a cardiovascular patient, you can rest assured that there is no lack of research being done on the various therapies available to you! Just this week, two studies focused on drug-eluting stents and an accompanying commentary piece on the findings appeared in the New England Journal of Medicine. Like other recent cardiovascular research, these two studies have received a good amount of media coverage, and justifiably so – cardiovascular disease is the number one cause of death in America and the treatments used in these studies are performed on millions of our patients each year. Just as patients are always on the look-out for news related to their condition, physicians are always eager to have solid research to help us provide the best possible patient care.

Here is my take on the two studies publicized this week. If you are interested in learning more about them, we’ve posted some additional information in Latest News.

Drug-eluting stents are just as safe and are significantly more effective than bare metal stents, particularly in sicker patients. Although patients have improved results with drug-eluting stents, patients with two or more blocked arteries appear to do somewhat better with a major surgical operation on the heart called a coronary artery bypass graft (many of you know it simply as “bypass surgery”). It is important that you realize this comes from the early experience with drug-eluting stents and, like many other similar studies, the results may be reversed as we look further into this issue. Despite this issue, in these studies, patients who have diabetes did not show this difference and may, therefore, do even better than we expected with stents.

Considering the two studies together, I’ve come to a broader, and perhaps more basic conclusion: At a time when communication is often on overload and information to guide our decision making is seemingly everywhere, so-called ‘old-fashioned’ face-to-face conversation between patient and doctor results in the best outcomes and the most satisfaction for patients. As you’re viewing health reports on the medical news or reading the headlines in your newspaper of choice, I’d ask you to keep this in mind – the best reason to be a well-informed patient is that you’ll be ready to ask your doctor good questions and you’ll more likely to feel good about the answers and the treatment you receive.