Therapeutic angiogenesis.

Abstract

Coronary artery disease remains the leading cause of morbidity and mortality in the Western world. The initial approach to treatment involves risk factor modification in an attempt to halt or slow the progression of disease. Treatment of symptomatic disease aims at reducing myocardial oxygen demand with medical therapy. When this fails, revascularization to restore blood supply by percutaneous coronary intervention or coronary artery bypass grafting is often necessary. Advances in medical technology have both increased the success rate and lowered the morbidity and mortality of these 2 procedures. However, a significant number of patients have diffuse coronary artery disease, absent conduits after previous bypass surgery, small distal vessels, and comorbidities that may preclude either procedure. In a recent analysis of 500 consecutive patients at a tertiary referral center, approximately 12% of these patients fell into this category (1). With the widespread use of revascularization, it is likely that the number of patients who will not be suitable for revascularization in the future will increase significantly. Therapeutic angiogenesis is an exciting new method of improving blood supply to an ischemic segment of the myocardium to provide symptomatic relief to a large and growing population of patients.