Lee CH, Ahn JM, Lee KS, et al. - Researchers utilized patient-level data from seven stent-specific, prospective drug-eluting stents (DES) registries, to ascertain the incidence as well as the clinical worth of procedural techniques on the results in ‘real-world’ patients with coronary artery calcification (CAC) receiving percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) with DESs. This analysis involved 17,084 patients who had PCI with various DES types. Target-vessel failure (TVF) was the primary outcome. The identified independent predictors of moderate/severe CAC were: older age, lower BMI, diabetes, hypertension, family history of coronary artery disease, and renal failure. Findings revealed a common (~10%) occurrence of moderate/severe CAC as well as its strong correlation with TVF during 3 years of observation span. For severe CAC, a significant impact of optimal lesion preparation with pre-balloon dilation on long-term outcomes was reported, particularly during the late period beyond 1 year.