Contemporary management of peripheral arterial disease

ABSTRACT

Traditional indications for invasive treatment in patients with peripheral arterial disease (PAD) have been salvage of a threatened limb or improvement of functional capacity in cases of disabling intermittent claudication, but advances in interventional therapy may be lowering the threshold for these therapies. Percutaneous transluminal angioplasty (PTA), with or without stent placement, is the most common endovascular intervention in patients with occlusive lower extremity PAD. In general, PTA is best suited to cases of short-segment stenosis or large-bore vessels, whereas surgery is best applied to multilevel occlusions involving smaller and more distant vessels. This article reviews endovascular therapy, catheter-based thrombolysis, and surgical revascularization procedures in patients with PAD, with special attention to recommendations from new American College of Cardiology/American Heart Association guidelines.