Newer stents may cause blood clots

Stents, the tiny cylindrical devices routinely used to widen arteries in the heart , may be the cause of life-threatening blood clots according to a leading Melbourne heart specialist, Professor Richard Harper from the Monash Medical Centre.

He said that the new type of ‘drug-eluting’ stent put into thousands of Australians each year as part of angioplasty treatment, were more dangerous than the older alternative.

The older bare metal stents, costing around $800 had been replaced by the newer $3,300 stents, as the older ones were prone to causing scar tissue, which re-narrowed the artery.

The newer stents were now associated with an increased, although small, incidence of stent thrombosis and associated problems.
Professor Harper said patients with the new stents should keep taking their blood thinning medications to reduce the risk of thrombosis, or blood clotting.