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It is important to follow your treatment plan, including taking medicines prescribed by your doctor, making healthy lifestyle choices, and getting regular medical checkups. It is also important to know your risk of and what to do if you experience complications that are specific to the stent in your body.

After the procedure to place a coronary stent, carotid stent, or airway stent, you will recover in the hospital for a few hours or overnight. For stent grafts, you may be in the hospital for a longer time. Although not common, you may also experience complications from the stenting procedure.

Having a stent placed is a minimally invasive procedure, meaning it is not a major surgery. Stents for coronary arteries and carotid arteries are placed in similar ways. A stent graft is placed to treat an aneurysm in a procedure called aortic aneurysm repair. Airway stents are placed in a procedure that helps open airways in the lung. For most stents, you will be given medicine to make you sleep during the procedure. The stent procedure may be planned ahead of time or it may be performed in an emergency situation.

Your doctor and specialists on your healthcare team can determine if you need a stent by using certain tests and procedures. If you need a stent, talk to your doctor about how to prepare for the procedure.

Your doctor may recommend a stent to provide support inside an artery that has become narrowed by plaque buildup from atherosclerosis, or for lung airways that have narrowed due to other medical conditions. Your doctor will discuss the risks and benefits of the procedure with you. Sometimes, a stenting procedure is not recommended or another procedure is recommended instead. Learn more about the use of stents in the following conditions.

There are different types of stents, such as bare metal stents, drug-eluting stents, or stent grafts, that may be used for different purposes. Stents used in the airways of the lungs include silicone stents and metal stents.