DK mini-culotte stenting in the treatment of true coronary bifurcation lesions: a propensity score matching comparison with T-provisional stenting

The conventional culotte technique remains not to be widely used for the treatment of coronary bifurcation lesions due to its inherent drawbacks. Here, we developed a double kissing mini-culotte stenting (DK mini-culotte) and assessed its efficacy and safety by a propensity score matching comparison (PSM) with T-provisional stenting. From June 2010 to June 2012, a total of 223 consecutive patients with true coronary bifurcation lesions (TCBLs) were treated with DK mini-culotte (91 patients with 92 lesions) or T-provisional stenting (132 patients with 135 lesions). We performed a PSM to correct the confounders from clinical and lesion's characteristics. The primary endpoint was cumulative major adverse cardiac event (MACE) at 1 year including cardiac death, myocardial infarction, and target vessel revascularization or target lesion revascularization (TVR/TLR). The secondary endpoint was the rate of side branch (SB) restenosis at 12 months. After a PSM, there were 66 patients in each group. Additional SB stenting in the T-provisional group was performed in 10 (15.2 %) lesions. The incidence of 1-year cumulative MACE was 4.55 % for the DK mini-culotte versus 13.6 % for T-provisional stenting (P = 0.127), the rate of TVR/TLR was 1.52 % for DK mini-culotte versus 12.12 % for T-provisional stenting (P = 0.033). The SB binary restenosis rate was 5.6 % in the DK mini-culotte group and 22.4 % in the T-provisional group (P = 0.014). In summary, despite that there is no difference in MACE between groups, DK mini-culotte significantly reduce TVR/TLR and SB restenosis in the treatment of true coronary bifurcation lesions.