[Directional coronary atherectomy after unsuccessful angioplasty].

Directional coronary atherectomy (DCA) is a percutaneous revascularization procedure. The basic indications are complex lesions (excentricity, irregular borders with ulceration and in non-calcified lesions in large coronary vessels or in vein grafts). DCA in recent years has been a useful procedure in several circumstances, in which initial results with conventional coronary angioplasty had failed, specifically in those conditions like acute occlusions, threatened closure or "elastic recoil" phenomenal, focal dissection or residual stenosis > 50% due to hare atherosclerotic plaque. In this report two cases of "rescue" DCA due to residual stenosis > 50% because of "elastic recoil" are presented. One of them had a concentric lesion and the other a marked excentricity. Both cases had primary success. Atheroma was shown by histopathology. Rescue DCA is a useful feasible alternative procedure in selected cases, in which conventional coronary angioplasty had initially not been successful.