Safe Options for Cardiac Lead Removal: Study Published in Heart Rhyt...( Spectranetics' Laser System Success...),Health

Spectranetics' Laser System Successfully Assists Removal of 975 Cardiac

Leads

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo., May 12 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- Spectranetics Corporation (Nasdaq: SPNC) today announced that a peer-reviewed study demonstrates Spectranetics' excimer laser sheath safely and effectively assists removal of pacing and defibrillator leads. The study, "Large, Single- catheter, Single-operator Experience with Transvenous Lead Extraction: Outcomes and Changing Indications," featured in the April issue of HeartRhythm, represents a seven year retrospective analysis of data from 498 lead extraction procedures involving 975 leads. The conclusion demonstrates safe extraction of leads successfully removed with laser assistance. HeartRhythm is the official journal of the Heart Rhythm Society and the Cardiac Electrophysiology Society.

As an escalating number of patients receive implanted cardiac devices, concerns surrounding lead management options are on the rise. Infection continues to be a primary cause for concern with leads, however, lead malfunction and patient lifespan are increasingly encouraging physicians to consider lead removal versus lead abandonment, the previous standard-of-care practice. Historically, safe, effective technologies designed to assist lead removal were limited but this is changing as new technologies enter the market and continue to receive clinical validation.

The Spectranetics Laser Sheath (SLS(R) II) use "cool" ultraviolet light to safely, effectively and efficiently ablate scar tissue that holds problematic leads in place. A circle of fibers that emit pulses of energy travel over the cardiac lead towards the tip to dissolve scar tissue that binds the lead to t
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