Poststent ballooning is associated with increased periprocedural stroke and death rate in carotid artery stenting.

Abstract

Whereas carotid endarterectomy (CEA) remains the "gold standard" treatment, given its low complication rate, carotid artery stenting (CAS) has emerged as a valid alternative in patients with prohibitive surgical risks. However, the application of CAS has been scrutinized, given its increased perioperative risk in comparison to CEA. Operators follow general guidelines in intraoperative techniques in CAS. However, few of those are evidence based. We believe that a specific outcome-driven examination of the effect of pre- and poststent deployment ballooning is warranted. The objective of this study was to analyze the effect of prestent ballooning (pre-SB) and poststent ballooning (post-SB) on hemodynamic depression (HD) and perioperative stroke or death.