MASSDEVICE ON CALL — Heart patients who receive drug-eluting stents have a lower likelihood of suffering a heart attack or blockage in the vessel downstream from the stent, according to researchers at Cleveland Clinic.
The research suggests that the drug coating on the stents may bring medicine to vessels beyond the area targeted by the DES.
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"Though there have been concerns about clots forming inside drug-releasing stents, the totality of data suggests that patients receiving drug-coated stents do better than patients receiving bare metal stents," lead investigator Dr. Richard Krasuski said in a press release. "Our study suggests that there may be more that the stent is doing. When blood flows through the stent, medication not only reaches the vessel it is touching but likely the distal vessel as well. In this way it could be having a much more profound effect on the vessel."
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