William Atkins
Thursday, 15 January 2009 19:58
Science -
Health
Page 1 of 4
A German-U.K.-U.S.-Denmark study has learned that many narrowed or blocked arteries to the heart may not need stents if a blood-flow test is first performed. Such testing before surgery was found to reduce the risk of complications and death afterwards.
The results of the study were published in the Thursday, January 15, 2009 issue of
The New England Journal of Medicine.
The article (volume 360:213-224, number 3) is entitled “
Fractional Flow Reserve versus Angiography for Guiding Percutaneous Coronary Internention.”
The authors state in the paper’s abstract:
“In patients with multivessel coronary artery disease who are undergoing percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), coronary angiography is the standard method for guiding the placement of the stent. It is unclear whether routine measurement of fractional flow reserve (FFR; the ratio of maximal blood flow in a stenotic artery to normal maximal flow), in addition to angiography, improves outcomes.”
Multivessel coronary artery disease (MCAD) is a critical factor in identifying acute myocardial infarction (heart attack).
It is defined generally as a 75% restriction (partial blockage, narrowing) of two or more major epicardial arteries.
Percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI), also called coronary angioplasty, or simply angioplasty, is the procedure used to treating the narrowing of coronary arteries of the heart.
In the study, the researchers used 1,005 randomly selected patients from twenty medical centers in the United States and Europe.
Page two continues with more details of the experiment.
