Long-term outcomes of plaque debulking with rotational atherectomy in side-branch ostial lesions to treat bifurcation coronary disease.

Background: The prognosis after rotational atherectomy of a side-branch ostium to treat bifurcation coronary lesions is unknown.
Methods: This was a retrospective case-review study of 40 consecutive patients who underwent rotational atherectomy of the sidebranch ostium to treat symptomatic bifurcation coronary lesions meeting the Medina classification (1,1,1) at our institution between 2003 and 2007.
Results: Twenty-two (55.0%) patients underwent rotational atherectomy of the side-branch ostium alone and 18 (45.0%) underwent rotational atherectomy of the both the main vessel and the sidebranch ostium. Most of the patients (n = 37, 92.5%) had a drug-eluting stent placed in the main vessel after rotational atherectomy. Only 8 patients (20.0%) required side-branch stents, and 2 patients (5.0%) underwent a final kissing-balloon technique. No acute closure of the side branch or coronary perforation were observed. Major adverse cardiac events included cardiac death (n = 1; 2.5%), nonfatal myocardial infarction (n = 1; 2.5%), target vessel revascularization (n = 2; 5.0%) and target lesion revascularization (n = 0; 0.0%) during the mean follow-up period of 21.3 +/- 18.5 months.
Conclusions: The study demonstrated safety and feasibility of rotational atherectomy and provisional side-branch stenting to treat side-branch ostial lesions of true severe bifurcation coronary artery disease. The study results suggest that rotational atherectomy of a side-branch ostium prior to main-vessel stenting may be an option in selected patients undergoing complex bifurcation lesion angioplasty.