STENT HAVING A MULTIPLICITY OF UNDULATING LONGITUDINALS

摘要

The present invention provides for an expandable stent for use in an artery or other vessel of a human body. The stent structure maintains the patency of the vessel within which the stent is expanded radially outward. One embodiment of the present invention is a stent having a multiplicity of frames joined together by at least two undulating longitudin al structures which can readily change their length in the longitudinal direction so as to provi de increased longitudinal flexibility for the stent for easy passage through and placemen t within a curved vessel such as a coronary artery. The stent is an embodiment of the present invention having frames joined with longitudinal structures and formed from a single, thin- walled piece of metal by means of laser cutting or chemical etching. Because the stent is fabricat ed from a single piece of metal, it provides a multiplicity of closed perimeter cells that are form ed as a continuous metal structure.