Superficial femoral artery stent fracture that led to perforation, hematoma and deep venous thrombosis.

We describe the case of a 70-year old male with total occlusion of the left superficial femoral artery (SFA) treated with percutaneous implantation of a self-expanding nitinol stent. The patient's course post-stent implantation was complicated by the development of stent fracture with SFA perforation and a large, compressive intramuscular hematoma with deep venous thrombosis (DVT). The patient returned to the catheterization laboratory where the fracture and perforation were successfully treated by the deployment of another stent across the fracture site.

Focal gap junction uncoupling and spontaneous ventricular ectopy.

Genetic studies in the mouse have demonstrated that conditional cardiac-restricted loss of connexin43 (Cx43), the major ventricular gap junction protein, is highly arrhythmogenic. However, whether more focal gap junction remodeling, as is commonly seen in acquired cardiomyopathies, influences the propensity for arrhythmogenesis is not known. We examined electrophysiological properties and the frequency of spontaneous and inducible arrhythmias in genetically engineered chimeric mice derived from injection of Cx43-deficient embryonic stem cells into wild-type recipient blastocysts.