Interview with Dr. Bernardo Cortese on the PICCOLETO II Study
We publish the full interview with Dr. Bernardo Cortese, extracted from the “Journal of Cardiovascular Medicine” on the PICCOLETO II Study, with the final 3-year follow up.
PICCOLETO Il trial was an international, investigator-driven, multicenter, open-label, prospective randomized controlled trial that aimed to compare the performance of paclitaxel drug-coated balloons (DCB) with everolimus-eluting stents (EES) in patients with small coronary vessel disease. The results of the trial showed that the new-generation DCB was superior to EES in terms of reducing late lumen loss (LLL) as seen in the angiographic pattern, and it was comparable in terms of clinical outcomes. In addition, the 3-year clinical follow-up of this trial also demonstrated a higher risk of major adverse cardiovascular events (MACEs) in patients treated with the current-generation DES compared to the new-generation paclitaxel DCB. Therefore, the PICCOLETO II trial suggests that DCB may be a potential alternative to DES for patients with small-diameter lesions in terms of both short- and long-term follow-up.