Retrograde recanalization of chronically occluded coronary arteries: illustration and description of the technique.

Chronic total occlusions remain one of the last frontiers in interventional cardiology, with far lower procedural success rates compared with other lesion subsets. The benefits of successful treatment include improvements in angina and survival. One method, which may improve technical success rates, is the use of a retrograde approach. We report three cases employing a retrograde approach and describe the technique in detail. (c) 2006 Wiley-Liss, Inc.