Rodent Inferior Vena Cava Venoplasty Balloon Model.

Balloon venoplasty is a commonly used clinical technique to treat deep vein stenosis and occlusion as a consequence of trauma, congenital anatomic abnormalities, acute deep vein thrombosis (DVT), or stenting. Chronic deep venous obstruction is histopathologically characterized by thrombosis, fibrosis, or both. Currently, no direct treatment is available to target these pathological processes. Therefore, a reliable in vivo animal model to test novel interventions is necessary. The rodent survival inferior vena cava (IVC) venoplasty balloon model (VBM) allows the study of balloon venoplasty in non-thrombotic and post-thrombotic conditions across multiple time points. The local and systemic effect of coated and uncoated venoplasty balloons can be quantified via tissue, thrombus, and blood assays such as real-time polymerase chain reaction (RT-PCR), western blot, enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay (ELISA), zymography, vein wall and thrombus cellular analysis, whole blood and plasma assays, and histological analysis. The VBM is reproducible, replicates surgical human interventions, can identify local vein wall-thrombi protein changes, and allows multiple analyses from the same sample, decreasing the number of animals required per group.

In vivo distribution of particulate matter from coated angioplasty balloon catheters.

Most catheter-based vascular medical devices today have hydrophilic lubricious coatings. This study was designed to perform a territory-based downstream analysis of end organs subsequent to angioplasty with coated balloon catheters to better understand the potential in vivo physiological consequence of coating wear materials. Coronary angioplasty was performed on swine using balloon catheters modified with two polyvinylpyrrolidone (PVP)-based coatings of similar lubricity, but different levels of particulates (5-fold) when tested in a tortuous path model. Myocardial tissues examined 28 days post-angioplasty revealed no visible particulates in the animals treated with the lower particulate catheters while 3 of 40 sections from higher particulate catheters contained amorphous foreign material, and 1 of 40 sections from tissue treated with uncoated catheters had amorphous foreign material. Non-target organs and downstream muscle revealed no particulates for any of the treatments. Histological analysis showed that the overall number of vessels with embolic foreign material was low and evidence of myocyte necrosis was rare with either of the coatings investigated in this study.