Stenting

#1

Dos stenting really work I have read that it only extends your life if you have a heart attack…doesnot extend life span to prevent a heart attach…

(KetoQ) #2

I’ve had three stents since March 2008.

Preventing a heart attack has more to do with keeping your arteries clear and open – so mostly eating right.

If you go back to old behaviors after a stent is implanted, you’ll likely reclog your arteries.

(Raj Seth) #3

I read/heard somewhere that stents have no meaningful health benefit, but that we still do them for $$$ billions annually. Kind of like we treat ulcers with expensive drugs when they have been know to be bacterial and treatable for at least 20-25 years

I can not find that science now though - help?

NVM - found it - NEJM study published 2007, follow up study 2012, article in NYT etc.

(Door Girl) #4

The industry was shocked that there wasn’t an actual health benefit to stents beyond feeling better. But not walking around with chest pain all the time isn’t sometyto be ignored either.

Around that time the phrase “occulostenotic reflex” was big at all the interventional cardiology conferences. It meant the tendency to stent any blockage seen, rather than based off symptoms.

Other than the increased risk of clots, particularly early and addressed by anticoagulants, there also wasn’t an increased risk either. So I’m not calling docs who stent symptomatic blockages cowboys or anything.

Oh, and beware taking health advice from the New York Times. Extrapolating the reduction in implantable defibrillators (ICDs) after their muckraking article about them with the fact that for every 7 ICDs implanted a life is saved, that article killed hundreds of people out of exaggerated fears.

(Raj Seth) #5

Preaching to the choir here 36 years in NYC and HATE NYT - but the NYT article led me to the sources…

(Door Girl) #6

I’m pretty sure their legal department required it that time around. :slight_smile: Those were definitely some of the better general purpose publications on the stent issue.