Balloons coated with a drug used to open blocked stents in heart arteries restore blood flow and also reduce bleeding in some high-risk patients, new research shows. Bare-metal stents, implanted to keep a blood vessel in the heart open during angioplasty, can narrow over time as scar tissue develops, which restricts blood flow and requires another procedure to widen the vessel, the researchers say. They were to present their findings Wednesday at the American Heart Association’s annual meeting in Orlando, Fla.
