Technology is “Booming” for the Baby Boomers

      Technology in medicine is evolving faster than ever before. Smaller devices, more effective medications and less invasive procedures are exploding on to the market. One technology on the rise is the use of bioresorbable stents. Up until this point, stents have been made of metal. The drawbacks associated with metal stents is that they are associated with acute and late thromobis, require the use of long-term dual anti-platelet therapy, prevent adequate CT or MRI tests, and interfere with vascular remodeling due to the metal scaffold in the artery. Metal stents also make future coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) procedures difficult, if not impossible (Fornell, 2014). 

      Most bioresorbable stents are made of polylactic acid, a naturally dissolvable material. Bioresorbable stents, as the name implies, break down and are absorbed by the body after a few years (Fornell, 2014). Since the stent is absorbed, it eliminates the risk of inflammation (which occurs with metal stents) that can lead to late-stent thrombosis and restenosis. Furthermore, once the stent disappears, the vessel returns to a natural state of physiologic functioning and does not interfere with any future procedures. Disadvantages to the using polymer include recoil after expansion, stent thickness causing maneuverability, and difficulty visualizing a non-metallic stent on fluoroscopy (Fornell, 2014). 

      There are nearly 15 bioresorbable stent programs in progress, with five in the advanced development stages. Samin Sharma, M.D., director of clinical and interventional cardiology at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York stated, “Dissolvable stents may be a future game-changer for the way we treat coronary artery disease and heart attack in the United States if proven to show clinical benefit in this nationwide clinical trial” (Fornell, 2014).
Although clinical outcomes and recent data is promising, experts believe that more development and experience is needed before polymer stents become the primary device. Stay tuned…

Reference

Fornell, D. (2014, September). Bioresorbable stents are the way   of the future. Retrieved February 5, 2015, from http://dicardiology.com/article/bioresorbable-stents-are-way-future