Context

Carotid artery stenosis causes up to 10% of all ischaemic strokes. Carotid endarterectomy (CEA) was introduced in the early 1950s and is an effective surgical treatment to prevent stroke. Carotid stenting (CAS) was introduced as a treatment to prevent stroke in 1994. Since then, both methods have been compared in a considerable number of studies. Three randomised controlled trials aiming to compare the outcome after CAS with CEA have been published in the last 4 years.1,–,3 Two of the three studies suggested a higher procedural risk in CAS. However, these studies were statistically underpowered to answer the question of whether stenting might be a safe alternative to endarterectomy in specific patient subgroups.4 The present study pooled the data from these three trials and performed a meta-analysis.