Percutaneous intentional extraluminal recanalisation of the femoropopliteal artery.

Percutaneous intentional extraluminal recanalisation (PIER) of the femoropopliteal artery is a new catheter technique to overcome long chronic occlusions. This technique was applied to 40 long chronic occlusions of the femoropopliteal segment. The mean length of the superficial femoral artery (SEA) occlusions was 16.9 cm, the mean length of the popliteal occlusions was 11.8 cm and the mean length of the femoropopliteal occlusions was 27.6 cm. Primary recanalisation success was 85%. Patency showed a significant correlation with poor initial angiographic result (p < 0.05). Life-time table analysis of the successful group demonstrated a primary clinical patency of 59% at 1 and 2 years and a secondary clinical patency of 71% at 1 year and 65% at 2 years. There were no serious complications related to this technique. PIER technique is simple and cost-effective, and shows a good initial success-rate with a promising 2 years clinical patency. This technique might be of importance for patients with a critical lower leg ischaemia, when there are contraindications for primary bypass surgery either from a technical or a general point of view.