The primary safety measure of major adverse cardiac events (MACE) at one year was comparable between diabetic patients treated with the TAXUS Express Stent and BMS (10.2% vs. 12.5%,>

Heart attack patients are often treated with bare-metal stents and are a more complicated patient population with known increased risks for death and stent thrombosis.  Additionally, diabetic patients generally have more long-term complications than interventional cardiology patients as a whole, and account for more than one-quarter of all coronary interventional procedures in the United States.  The diabetic subset population in the HORIZONS AMI trial presented with more complex baseline characteristics than non-diabetic patients, including significantly higher measures of weight, hypertension, peripheral vascular disease, renal insufficiency, prior MI, prior percutaneous coronary intervention and prior coronary artery bypass graft surgery.

With 3,006 patients enrolled worldwide, HORIZONS AMI is the largest randomized trial to compare the use of drug-eluting stents to bare-metal stents in AMI patients.    

SOURCE Boston Scientific Corporation