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Australia

"Dissolvable stents for WA heart patients"

Source: NineMSN

Published: 07 Aug 2012

Category: Surgical Procedure

Rating: (2½ stars)

Keywords: stent cardiology heart

what they said (Hover the mouse cursor over underlined words for more info)

Cardiologists at Fremantle Hospital recently achieved a WA first when they successfully inserted a dissolvable stent into the heart of a patient.

The original article can be found at: http://news.ninemsn.com.au/health/8512371/dissolvable-stents-for-wa-heart-patients

how did it rate? (more information)

Criteria	Rating
Total Score	4 of 9
Novelty of Treatment	Satisfactory (?)
Availability of Treatment	Satisfactory (?)
Treatment Options	Satisfactory (?)
Disease Mongering	Satisfactory (?)
Evidence	Not Satisfactory (?)
Quantification of Benefits of Treatment	Not Satisfactory (?)
Harms of Treatment	Not Satisfactory (?)
Costs of Treatment	Not Satisfactory (?)
Sources of Information	Not Satisfactory (?)
Relies on Press Release	Not Applicable

what we said (Hover the mouse cursor over underlined words for more info)

This story lacks lot of important information. We are told this is a new procedure 'to widen blocked coronary arteries' is better than the existing kind of stent and that results from initial trials were positive. However, no information about the trials are provided - what kind of trials were they and how 'positive' were the results, are the new stents clinically significantly better than the old ones?. Also, there's no information about the cost of this new stent compared to the existing treatment. An independent expert would have added to the story in terms of getting a second opinion.

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