Most angioplasties are unnecessary

An aside from Plastic Surgery 101 for today:

Major, major historic moment in the history of modern medicine was announced in a presentation today at the American College of Cardiology meeting in New Orleans IMO.

More than half a million people a year with chest pain are likely getting an unnecessary or premature procedure to unclog their arteries because drugs are just as effective and cardiac bypass (CABG) is superior on symptom relief and mortality data. You can read the AP wire summary here.

This single paper may dramatically change the way we treat coronary artery disease overnight around the world and potentially save billions of wasted dollars in procedural and device-related costs. It will be interesting to see how warmly this is received by interventional cardiologists who've commanded top salaries treating many non-emergent angina cases (which were reviewed in the study) in the cath lab :)