Percutaneous intervention for left main coronary artery disease: Treatment for left main coronary artery disease

Abstract

Current evidence from real-practice registry data and clinical trials has suggested that percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) with stenting can achieve similar safe outcome rates, e.g., concerning death, MI, and stroke, as standard coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) for patients with unprotected LMCA (left main coronary artery) disease. The inferior efficacy outcome with stenting should be revolutionized with a newer generation of DES. Ongoing large randomized clinical trials with long-term follow-up, such as the EXCEL trials using second-generation DES, can provide more confirmative answers. In the future, this cumulative evidence might prompt many interventional cardiologists to choose PCI with DES as an alternative or replacement treatment option for patients with LMCA disease instead of CABG.