Transradial approach for percutaneous coronary interventions on chronic total occlusions

The transfemoral approach is the standard approach for performing chronic total occlusion procedures. However, hemorrhagic and vascular entry site complications are known to be reduced by the adoption of the transradial approach. Thus, the transradial approach is gaining interest and, facilitated by the improvement of materials and techniques, will be applied in procedures previously considered possible only by femoral access. In this article, we review the data regarding the feasibility and safety of the transradial approach for chronic total occlusion percutaneous coronary interventions and provide an overview of the technical aspects useful for performing chronic total occlusion by radial access. © 2010 Future Medicine Ltd.