Objective: We aimed to conduct a meta-analysis of treatments for large vessel coronary artery disease between drug-coated balloons and drug-eluting stents. Method: We searched databases including PubMed, Web of Science, Cochrane, CNKI, and Wanfang, and selected randomized controlled trials (RCTs) or cohort studies which compared drug-coated balloons (DCBs) with drug-eluting stents (DESs). The reference vessel diameter (RVD) should be greater than 2.75 mm. The results of 12 studies with a total of 2634 patients were included in this meta-analysis. Results: The results showed that the DCB group was not inferior to the DES group in terms of the incidence of target lesion revascularization (TLR). (RR = 1.25, 95% CI: 0.84, 1.85, p = 0.27, I2 = 0%), and the incidence of bleeding events in the DCB group was lower than that in the DES group (RR = 0.30, 95% CI: 0.15, 0.59, p = 0.0004). The results also showed that the post-intervention minimal lumen diameter (MLD) in the DCB group was smaller than that in the DES group. (RR = −0.37, 95% CI: −0.59, −0.16, p = 0.0007), but the follow-up MLD in the DCB group was not less than that in the DES group (RR = −0.03, 95% CI: −0.14,−0.08, p = 0.61). Additionally the DCB group had less late lumen loss (LLL) compared with the DES group. (RR = −0.31, 95% CI: −0.60, −0.02, p 2.75 mm.
Zeng et al. (Wed,) studied this question.