Angioplasty is of course a common procedure for people who’ve had heart attacks or are at risk of one.
Here’s a surprising study that is a bit counter-intuitive.
Study Says Late Angioplasty Seems Futile – washingtonpost.com
New research has overturned one of the most fundamental beliefs among doctors treating heart attacks: that opening a blocked artery is always a good idea, even days or weeks later.
Instead, the study revealed that doing this too late may not help, and there were disturbing hints that it might even be harmful. People who had balloon angioplasty to open an artery three to 28 days after their heart attacks fared no better than those given standard medicines to prevent a second attack.
The results don’t apply to most Americans suffering a heart attack, but suggest that 100,000 of them a year might be able to skip the expense and risk of angioplasty and take medications instead, doctors said.
"These findings were really a surprise," said Dr. Elizabeth Nabel, director of the National Heart, Lung and Blood Institute, which funded the large international study. "For a long time we thought that opening up the artery any time after a heart attack was better than leaving it closed. My guess is you may see some guideline recommendations" on what to do in such situations, she said…
… the findings suggest that once a blocked vessel had caused a heart attack, opening it was no better than taking standard medications for preventing future problems.
"There is a reason to rethink angioplasty" in such situations, said Dr. Timothy Gardner, a cardiologist at Christiana Care Health Services in Wilmington, Del., and chairman of the Heart Association program committee that reviewed the research.
Here’s the NY Times report:Study Questions Angioplasty Use in Some Patients – New York Times
Leave a Reply