LATE THROMBOSIS IN DRUG ELUTING STENTS

Background: Late thrombosis in drug eluting stents (DES) seems to be a more serious problem than expected. There is a lot of controversies among the experts worldwide and the data published are often incomplete and uncertain.
Methods: We have followed up 146 consecutive patients to whom DES were implanted in our institution since 2002 till 2005. With these patients we have paired 146 patients, who received bare metal stents (BMS) always immediately after the patient with DES implantation. The aim of our retrospective study has been to show what is the mortality rate difference between both groups.
We have found out the main cause of death and the section report by contacting the physicians  taking care of the patients before they died.
Results: The all cause mortality was 10.3% (n=15) in DES vs 10.9% (n=16) in BMS patients (NS). There were 33.3% (5/15) sudden deaths in DES group compared to the 50.0% (8/16) in BMS group. The average follow up was 42 Months.The time from the stent implantation to death was  17.25 months in DES group and 10.0 months in BMS.
Conclusion: The all cause mortality and sudden death in patients receiving BMS was nonsignificantly higher than in DES group.