MY PICK FROM THE EURO PCR 2008

The EuroPCR 2008 just ended in Barcelona. I am sure that it was well attended. Nowadays, the WWW keep us well informed. Looks like nothing earth-shuttering came out of EuroPCR 2008. The same old PCI techniques, with the same old good results. But two reports caught my eyes. In the first, from a group in Poland comparing PCI with IVUS and without IVUS. Well, it was obvious that IVUS or not ( despite the increase human cost and financial cost ), did not translate to patient benefit. This was a simple one center study done by the more practical Polish ( Europeans ). In the ensuring discussion, it was obvious that the Americans ( can I say ugly Americans ), try to Lord it over the Europeans, saying that the study was poorly done with poor protocol and methology. Basically, everything done by the Poles were not up to standard. The Poles were ably defended by their French colleagues who were quite adamant that routine IVUS for all PCI was a waste of time and funds. The second thing that I took from the EuroPCR proceedings was that the second generation DES is better than the first generation. Data was presented on the two year FU of Nobori and Xience V stents ( by Terumo and Abbott respectively ) showing that they were both better than Taxus. I had written about this earlier. So it just serve to proof what we knew all along. Quite apart from EuroPCR, I hear that JnJ has takenup commercial TV time to directly advertise the Cypher stent to the consumer. Something which I am sure the FDA and also the US senate will look into. I think that it is very unfair and improper, to bring a sophisticated medical device to the lay public, who obviously do not understand all the issues about DES. Is this a sign of desperation or what?