Technical aspects of the culotte technique.

The culotte technique provides near perfect coverage of the carina and side branch ostium at the expense of an excess of metal covering the proximal end. It can be used in almost all true bifurcation lesions, but should be avoided in bifurcations when there is a large mismatch between the proximal main branch and the side branch diameters. The main disadvantage of this technique is that rewiring of both branches through the stent struts is required, which can be difficult, technically demanding, and time-consuming.