Polymer-based or Polymer-free Stents in Patients at High Bleeding Risk.

BACKGROUND: Polymer-free drug-coated stents provide superior clinical outcomes to bare-metal stents in patients at high bleeding risk who undergo percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) and are treated with 1 month of dual antiplatelet therapy. Data on the use of polymer-based drug-eluting stents, as compared with polymer-free drug-coated stents, in such patients are limited. METHODS: In an international, randomized, single-blind trial, we compared polymer-based zotarolimus-eluting stents with polymer-free umirolimus-coated stents in patients at high bleeding risk. After PCI, patients were treated with 1 month of dual antiplatelet therapy, followed by single antiplatelet therapy. The primary outcome was a safety composite of death from cardiac causes, myocardial infarction, or stent thrombosis at 1 year. The principal secondary outcome was target-lesion failure, an effectiveness composite of death from cardiac causes, target-vessel myocardial infarction, or clinically indicated target-lesion revascularization. Both outcomes were powered for noninferiority. RESULTS: A total of 1996 patients at high bleeding risk were randomly assigned in a 1:1 ratio to receive zotarolimus-eluting stents (1003 patients) or polymer-free drug-coated stents (993 patients). At 1 year, the primary outcome was observed in 169 of 988 patients (17.1%) in the zotarolimus-eluting stent group and in 164 of 969 (16.9%) in the polymer-free drug-coated stent group (risk difference, 0.2 percentage points; upper boundary of the one-sided 97.5% confidence interval [CI], 3.5; noninferiority margin, 4.1; P = 0.01 for noninferiority). The principal secondary outcome was observed in 174 patients (17.6%) in the zotarolimus-eluting stent group and in 169 (17.4%) in the polymer-free drug-coated stent group (risk difference, 0.2 percentage points; upper boundary of the one-sided 97.5% CI, 3.5; noninferiority margin, 4.4; P = 0.007 for noninferiority). CONCLUSIONS: Among patients at high bleeding risk who received 1 month of dual antiplatelet therapy after PCI, use of polymer-based zotarolimus-eluting stents was noninferior to use of polymer-free drug-coated stents with regard to safety and effectiveness composite outcomes. (Funded by Medtronic; ONYX ONE ClinicalTrials.gov number, NCT03344653.).

Frequency of Stent Thrombosis Risk at 5 Years in Women Versus Men With Zotarolimus-Eluting Compared With Sirolimus-Eluting Stent.

The prevalence of factors that are associated with an increased risk of stent thrombosis (ST), including smoking, diabetes mellitus, and small stent size, is different in women and men who underwent percutaneous coronary intervention. Thus, gender may potentially modify the relation between stent type and the incidence of ST during long-term follow-up. We explored the data of Patient Related Outcomes With Endeavor Versus Cypher stenting Trial (PROTECT) to evaluate this hypothesis. PROTECT randomized 2,061 women and 6,648 men who underwent percutaneous coronary intervention for various indications to Endeavor zotarolimus-eluting stenting (E-ZES) or Cypher sirolimus-eluting stenting (C-SES). Dual antiplatelet therapy was prescribed for at least 3 months. Data on study end points were collected until 5 years after randomization, including ST, death, and cardiovascular events. We analyzed end points and treatment effect (E-ZES vs C-SES) in relation to gender. Women were on average 4.7 years older (65.8 vs 61.1), had a higher prevalence of insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus, were less often smokers, and had a shorter total stent length than men. At discharge and throughout follow-up, a slightly lower fraction of women were using dual antiplatelet therapy. During 5-year follow-up, definite or probable ST was observed in 36 women (1.8%) and 152 men (2.4%; log-rank p = 0.15). E-ZES reduced the incidence of ST compared with C-SES in women (hazard ratio 0.58) and men (hazard ratio 0.61), with no evidence of heterogeneity (p = 0.89). In conclusion, in PROTECT, women and men had similar cumulative incidence of ST at 5 years after stent placement. The favorable effect of the study stent E-ZES over C-SES was not modified by gender.