Usefulness of chronic total occlusion devices and techniques in other complex lesion subsets

Percutaneous coronary interventions (PCI) in chronic total occlusion (CTO) have been for long time considered as “last frontier” in interventional cardiology. Among the different subset of complex targets for PCI, CTO lesions represent a challenge for the interventional cardiologist. CTO techniques and devices have evolved in last few years together with the training of specialized interventional cardiologist in such complex field. All these factors have markedly increased procedural success of CTO procedures and have the potential to be applied in other settings. In this paper, we provide an update on the technical aspects and the devices developed for CTO PCIs that can be applied in complex PCI on non-CTO lesions.