A Comparison of Clinical Outcomes for Diabetic and Nondiabetic Patients Following Directional Atherectomy in the DEFINITIVE LE Claudicant Cohort

Purpose: To report a subset analysis that evaluated the hypothesis that directional atherectomy for peripheral artery disease in diabetic claudicants has noninferior primary patency at 12 months compared with nondiabetic claudicants. Methods: DEFINITIVE LE, a US/European multicenter study, assessed the effectiveness of directional atherectomy using SilverHawk/TurboHawk systems for treatment of peripheral artery disease in the superficial femoral, popliteal, and infrapopliteal arteries. Of the 800 patients enrolled in the study, only the 598 claudicant patients (mean age 69.5±10.4 years; 336 men) who were classified at baseline as Rutherford category 1–3 were eligible for this subset analysis. Of these, 46.8% (280/598) had diabetes. Follow-up to 12 months included duplex ultrasound examination, functional assessments, and adverse event evaluations. Independent angiographic and duplex ultrasound core laboratories assessed primary patency and secondary endpoints; a clinical events committee adjudicated adverse events. Results: Although diabetics had significantly more baseline comorbidities, 12-month primary patency (77.0%) was no different than for nondiabetics (77.9%; superiority p=0.98; noninferiority p