Artery, Heal Thyself

"It sounds like science fiction: A stent made of bioabsorbable plastic simply dissolves back into the bloodstream within a year or two after its work opening an artery is done--similar to the way sutures or bone screws are ultimately absorbed.

Stent designers have spent decades pursuing this goal, with little success. But drug and medical-devices company Abbott Laboratories --the leader in old-style, bare-metal stents, with $24 billion in revenues--is finally showing progress. Abbott's new stent, called Absorb, is made of polylactic acid and coated with a drug called Everolimus; the water in the artery wall eventually breaks down the polylactic acid into lactic acid, a naturally produced substance. That lactic acid is then absorbed into the body as carbon dioxide and water, leaving nothing behind."

A Abbott desenvolveu um novo endoprótese expansível reabsorvíeis pelo corpo que pode revolucionar o mundo da cirurgia cardiovascular. Um negócio de $ 5 biliões.