Figure 14.3 Chronic total occlusion of the left circumflex artery (left panel).The

Several strategies have been advocated to treat bifurcation lesions with PCI, such as deployment of stents in both vessels, stenting in one branch with balloon angioplasty in the other, and mechanical debulking. The published reports regarding the subsequent need for target lesion revascularization utilizing bare stents range from 17% to 53%,148,152,153 thus the rate of 8.6% in the present series is therefore very favorable (Figures 14.2, 14.3, and 14.4). In addition, the rate observed in the current study may underestimate the true beneficial treatment effect of SES as explained below.