Medication as Effective as Heart Surgery in Many Heart Blockage Cases

A landmark study released in the New England Journal of Medicine and simultaneously presented at a national meeting of The American College of Cardiology has found that, in non-emergency situations, treatment heart blockage with common drugs is as effective as more heart surgery procedures like invasive angioplasty and implanting blood vessel stents.

Stenting is the process by which blood vessels feeding the heart that have become blocked by cholesterol plaques are enlarged by placing a hollow cylindrical device in the vessel itself, while angioplasty seeks the same result by dilating the vessels using a small balloon.

In light of this data it is estimated that the majority of stenting procedures performed in the United States are actually unnecessary. At an average cost of almost $40,000 per procedure, a decrease in the number of procedures performed could represent a significant cost savings.