Stents Stumble
Enthusiasm wanes for drug-coated artery tubes
By Brian Vastag
At a cardiology meeting in Stockholm 6 years ago, attendees witnessed what seemed to be the birth of a new era in treating heart disease. In the first large study of drug-coated stents—tiny mesh tubes that prop open clogged arteries—all the implanted arteries stayed open. The data were so stunning that after French researcher Marie-Claude Morice presented the study results, audience members stood and applauded.
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“I remember it well,” says Robert Harrington of Duke University Medical Center in Durham, N.C. “You don’t see people get a standing ovation at a scientific meeting. There was this tremendous hope that we had finally beat it.”