I am 65 years old. I am very active as I play badminton 3 times a week for more then 30 years. Sometime in 2009 I had angioplasty done. Three of my arteries were blocked and the heart surgeon were successful in implanting 3 medicated heart stens. I had been taking medication since then to lower my blood cholesterol and blood thinning medicine. Since then I have been as active both in my work schedule and exercise. My question is how long will the medicated stens last? And do I get the same symptoms of impending heart attack like numbness of the left arm, sweating and fatigue, if the stens are not functioning?
Hello. Thank you for the question and welcome to Chat Doctor. I will try to be as thorough as I can. There is a vast body of data from various studies about medicated stents (Chat Doctor.  We can always restrict our discussion to the rate of blockage within the stent (insistent re-stenosis). DE stents are like bare metal stents (BMS), except that they have a lining with a hypostatic (anti-proliferative) 