The Wall Street Journal-20080128-Drug-Coated Stents Keep Status in U-K

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Drug-Coated Stents Keep Status in U.K

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The United Kingdom's National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence will keep its existing recommendations regarding the cost- effectiveness of drug-coated stents, according to people familiar with the matter. The decision means the U.K.'s National Health Service will continue to pay for the fanciest kind of heart stent -- those coated with drugs to prevent arteries from reclogging. Last year, the agency opined in a draft recommendation that drug-coated stents weren't worth the extra cost. But arteries opened with bare stents clog and require a repeat procedure about 8% of the time, compared with roughly 4% for coated stents. The reversal is good news for manufacturers, including Boston Scientific Corp., Johnson & Johnson, Abbott Laboratories, and Medtronic Inc.