BACKGROUNDRecently, numerous randomized and controlled trials have demonstrated great advantages of drug eluting stents (DES) with respect to significant reduction of restenosis and recurrence of symptoms and improvement of clinical outcomes after percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI). Little is known about the comparative effects between DES and bare metal stents (BMS) for bifurcation angioplasty in the Chinese population. We compared the inpatient and 7-month follow-up outcomes between DES and BMS for the treatment of bifurcation lesions.

METHODSFrom April 2004 to October 2005, 291 Chinese patients [85.9% male, mean age (57.8 +/- 10.4) years] underwent DES (387 lesions) and/or BMS (297 lesions) implantation for bifurcation lesions. Clinical and angiographic follow-up was performed at 7 months.

RESULTSCompared with BMS group, patients in DES group had significantly lower rates of restenosis at main branch (9.5% vs 28.7%, P < 0.001) or side branch (14.5% vs 37.0%, P < 0.001) and major adverse cardiac events (MACE) (14.0% vs 26.3%, P = 0.000). The occurrence rate of late in-stent thrombosis did not differ between the two groups in both main (0.8% vs 0, P = 0.224) and side branches (1.4% vs 0, P = 0.198). Target lesion revascularization (TLR) was less frequent in DES group for main branch (8.3% vs 21.3%, P < 0.001) and for side branch (7.6% vs 23.5%, P < 0.001). Multivariate regression analysis revealed that total stent length (OR = 1.029, P = 0.01), postprocedural in-stent minimum lumen diameter (OR = 0.476, P = 0.03) and stent type (OR = 3.988, P = 0.0001) were independent predictors of TLR for main branch. Prior history of coronary intervention (OR = 2.424, P = 0.041), angulated lesion (OR = 2.337, P = 0.033), postdilation (OR = 0.267, P = 0.035) and stent type (DES vs BMS, OR = 5.459, P = 0.000) were independent predictors of TLR for side branch.

CONCLUSIONThe implantation of DES may be associated with greater reduction of restenosis and TLR than BMS in bifurcations angioplasty.