When doable, it is the favored treatment versus coronary artery bypass grafting (CABG) as it is less invasive.

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To get close to profitability, Price is also betting on Neutralase, a drug that would be used in coronary-artery bypass graft operations--more commonly referred to as open-heart surgery.

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From 1999 through 2001, two of the 175 patients on whom Isom performed a simple coronary artery bypass graft (CABG) died, a 1.14 percent mortality rate, according to figures recently released by the New York State Department of Health.

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But he said it could only be used for a specific type of bypass, where an artery is open in the first portion, closed in the middle and still supplying good heart muscle.

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They also received two to three times as many pacemakers, implantable defibrillators, cardiac-bypass operations, carotid endarterectomies, and coronary-artery stents.

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But sometimes scar tissue formed inside the stent, causing artery to close up again-leading to a repeat procedure or to heart bypass surgery.

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