CORONARY ANGIOPLASTY WITH CONTROLLED LONGITUDINAL DISSECTION - PRELIMINARY CLINICAL-RESULTS WITH A NEW CUTTING BALLOON

A recently developed cutting balloon was used for coronary angioplasty in 21 patients (4 women, 17 men; mean age 57.6 [36-81] years) with co ronary heart disease (angioplasty of the right coronary artery in 4, o f the circumflex branch in 4, and of the anterior interventricular bra nch in 13 patients). The ballon contains 3-4 longitudinally arranged m etal cutters to prevent uncontrolled vessel tears. An average stenosis reduction from 84 +/- 8.6% to 30 +/- 10.6% was achieved in ten patien ts. In the eleven others a second dilatation with a conventional ballo on was necessary because of a residual stenosis of over 50 % after the first dilatation with the cutting balloon. This reduced the original stenosis from 78.6 +/- 9.4% to 30.4 +/- 9.9%. Complete occlusion at th e place of previous dilatation occurred in one patient 14 hours after the procedure, due to a dissection which required a stent implantation . These preliminary results suggest that the cutting balloon can achie ve a stenosis reduction similar to that with a conventional balloon.