Intravascular bioresorbable polymeric stents: a potential alternative to current drug eluting metal stents.

Stent implantation following angioplasty is the standard treatment of coronary artery disease necessitating interventional procedures. The use of stents as a platform for local drug delivery is a popular strategy to achieve local pharmacological treatment to the diseased artery. Drug eluting stents (DES) are now largely preferred to bare metal stents when stent implantation is necessary. Lately, there have been several reports questioning the long-term safety of DES. An alternative to these drug eluting metal stents are bioresorbable polymeric stents (BPS) because of the many advantages of bioresorbable material. However, the fundamental differences in polymeric and metallic materials make the development of such an alternative a significant challenge. This review discusses the different advantages of BPS and the many constrains and requirements of such devices. An up to date commented review of published data concerning BPS is presented. Considerations are given on using BPS as local drug delivery systems as well as on evaluating BPS performances. Copyright 2007 Wiley-Liss, Inc.