SurModics Inc (SRDX)

[shears]

Boston Scientific Exec: Patients Will Return to Stents

From WSJ’s blog on health and the business of health.
July 20, 2007, 12:32 pm

Posted by Jacob Goldstein
As Boston Scientific announced worse-than-expected earnings this morning, the company’s COO argued that many patients who have recently opted to receive drug treatment instead of stents for coronary artery disease will wind up getting stents eventually.

“A lot of patients are now on more aggressive medical management,” COO Paul LaViolette said, according to a conference call transcript from Thomson Financial. “History shows us, data shows us those patients don’t tolerate the drugs well, they don’t stay on drug protocols long.”

Some patients now being treated with drugs will undoubtedly wind up getting stents. But it’s not clear how many. And recent trends suggest the go-go days of stenting won’t be back anytime soon. Indeed, U.S. doctors implanted fewer stents last month than they had in any month during the past year, the WSJ’s Keith Winstein reported this morning.

U.S. sales of Boston Scientific’s drug-eluting stents were down 41% to $249 million in the second quarter compared with the year-earlier quarter, the company said today. (The percent decline was nearly identical to the 41% fall for rival J&J’s stents).

Sales of the company’s implantable defibrillators also fell. Overall, the company earned $115 million during the second quarter, down from last year and well below analysts’ estimate of $150 million.