Stents As Effective as Surgery for Clogged Carotid Arteries

There was a study recently done at Loyola University that compared traditional surgery with stenting to clear clogged carotid arteries. The study, named CREST (Carotid Revascularization Endarterectomy vs. Stenting Trial) was done in a nine-year period throughout the United States and Canada. It is one of the largest studies of its kind. The CREST study found that the safety and efficacy of both procedures were similar.

Carotid arteries on each side of the neck supplies blood to the brain and as a person ages, plague can build up. It causes the artery to stiffen and narrow, increasing the risk for stoke if the artery gets blocked. Sometimes pieces of plague can break off and travel to the brain causing a mini-stroke, called a transient ischemic attack.

The standard treatment is doing an endartectomy, which is when the surgeon peels out the plague deposit by removing the inner lining of the clogged artery. Another newer treatment would be using stents inserted via catheter. The stent expands inside the artery and increases blood flow.

The two different procedures have their advantages and disadvantages, depending on the patient's age and health. Since this study shows that a traditional surgery and inserting a stent are both effective, the doctor and patient have more freedom to choose which procedure to undergo depending on his or her medical condition. This is important because the treatment strategy is able to be more individualized to the patient. An important outcome from this study was the discovery that there were more heart attacks in the surgery group, while the stenting group had more strokes.

I found this article interesting because I was not sure whether surgery or stents were more effective to clear up clogged carotid arteries, since stenting is a more recent treatment method. My grandparents have had heart problems, so I wondered whether stenting or surgery would have been more effective. Since the treatments are able to be individualized to the patient, based on his or her age and medical condition, doctors would be able to select the best treatment based on the person more often than depending on only one treatment and what needs to be done.

This article was found at

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/02/100226161439.htm