Heart Stent Patients Don’t Need Overnight Stay in Move Seen to Save Costs, Duke University Medical Center Reveals

Patients with clogged arteries who get a heart stent implanted to hold open the vessels may safely be released from the hospital the same day as the procedure, potentially reducing health-care costs, a study found. Those sent home the day they received a stent were just as healthy as patients hospitalized overnight for observation, according to research today in the Journal of the American Medical Association. No difference between the groups was seen in the rates of death and readmission to the hospital at two days or 30 days after the procedure, the study found.