A Medical Device Daily

Cordis (Miami Lakes, Florida) reported that its Cypher sirolimus-eluting coronary stent reduced by more than half the rate of major adverse cardiac events (MACE) compared to the Taxus Stent in small coronary vessels. That data appears this week in the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

In a randomized controlled trial of more than 1,000 patients, the Cypher drug-eluting stent (DES) reduced MACE by 55%, mainly driven by a 69% reduction of target lesion revascularization.

“Percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) in small vessel disease is associated with an increased risk of major adverse cardiac events,” said Hans-Peter Stoll, MD, director of clinical research and medical affairs for Cordis in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. “This randomized clinical trial ... found that there were significant differences between the performance of these two products in small and often difficult-to-treat vessels.”

SIRTAX is an independent, randomized, 1,012 patient study that included patients with angina and also a large percentage of patients who were suffering from an acute myocardial infarction at the time of stent placement.

The next version of sirolimus-eluting stent, the Cypher Select Sirolimus-eluting coronary stent, was launched in Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America and Canada in 2003. The Cypher Select Plus stent, the third version of a sirolimus DES, received the CE mark last year.