China's first home-made stent that degrades in the body of patients with coronary artery disease has been clinically tested at Zhongshan Hospital.

A 30-year-old man with coronary artery disease received the degradable stent last Thursday and is recovering well, the hospital announced yesterday.

Stents are mesh tubes inserted through cather via artery in the wrist or thigh to open up blocked arteries, allowing blood to flow to the heart.

A conventional metal stent stays in the heart forever even after serving its purpose six months after the surgery.

"Staying in the body means there is always a risk of inflammation, which can result in fatal in-stent blood clot," said Dr Ge Junbo of the hospital's department of cardiology and the degradable stent developer.

"The metal stent forces patients to have anti-platelet drug for a long time which can damage the blood vessels."

Though there are stents coated with drugs that prevent clogging and stents with degradable drug, the metal stent remains in the patient's body.

Ge teamed up with a Shandong biological company to develop a biodegradable sirolimus-loaded poly-l-lactic acid stent, which dissolves into the artery wall within two to three years after being implanted.

Since the stent leaves no foreign material permanently in the artery, chances of adverse reaction is extremely low.

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