At this year’s Leipzig Interventional Course (LINC 2023; 6–9 June, Leipzig, Germany), Sabine Steiner (Leipzig, Germany) shared first results from the BEST superficial femoral artery (SFA) pilot study—a prospective, multicentre randomised trial comparing the efficacy and safety of a ‘stent-avoiding’ (using drug-coated balloons) versus a ‘stent-preferred’ (using drug-eluting or interwoven stents) approach for the treatment of complex SFA lesions.
This trial includes 120 patients and was designed to assess two “diverse” strategies for femoropopliteal intervention, Steiner shares in this interview with Vascular News following her first-time data release presentation at LINC.
Steiner underlines in the interview the fact that the patients included in the study, who had symptomatic femoropopliteal Rutherford category 2–4 disease, had “very long and complex lesions”. In addition, she points out that 80% presented with chronic total occlusions, leading her to make the point that “this is really a chronic total occlusion trial”.
Pointing to what is next in this space, Steiner notes that the patients will be followed up for five years. In addition, she shares thoughts on what should be the focus of future research in this space, commenting that is it “very important” to have studies going on that will focus on improved outcomes with lesion preparation, which she notes have yet to be shown.
