Association of stent-induced changes in coronary geometry with late stent failure: Insights from three-dimensional...

The relationship between vessel angulation and large changes in vessel geometry after stent implantation and the occurrence of stent failure still remains unclear. We sought to investigate the association of the change in the coronary bending angle after stenting and the risk for late stent failure by three-dimensional quantitative coronary angiography (3D QCA).

The bending angle in coronary lesions that presented with late stent failure and those without stent failure was computed during the cardiac cycle, before and after stenting using a recently developed 3D QCA software.

A total of 40 lesions with stent failure (cases) were successfully matched to 47 lesions without stent failure (controls).The mean duration to follow-up coronary angiography was 1,011 days in cases and 1,109 days in the control group (P = 0.14). In stent failure, the systolic bending angle after stenting was smaller (14.45° [12.18, 17.68] versus 18.20° [14.00, 20.30], P = 0.01), while the stent-induced change in systolic bending angle was significantly larger (4.15° [1.13, 7.20] versus 1.80° [-1.90, 4.40], P = 0.004). Multivariable logistic regression analysis suggested that systolic bending angle after stenting (odds ratio: 0.88; 95% CI: 0.79-0.99; P = 0.03), and decrease in systolic bending angle after stenting (odds ratio: 1.13; 95% CI: 1.02-1.26; P = 0.03) were predictors of stent failure.

Our study suggests that a change in the natural tortuous course of the coronaries by stent implantation with the decrease in coronary bending angle is a potentially major contributor in stent failure.