What are your thoughts on a partially collapsed stent

Oct 2010, my husband had a stent put in his LAD, first time ever, at age 56, having never been on heart or any other meds previously. Less than a year later, basically around June 2011, he began to have a pain or 'attack' , that would only come on in the evening, usually right as he was getting into bed, and he would have to concentrate all efforts on staying calm and relaxed, and it would then go away, and not return. This was happening approximately 4 nights a week on average. He went to his cardiologist after a couple of months of it, in september. He was told it was too close (11months) from his stent insertion to do a stress test (&get a valid result) so he suggested a catheterization, which he said was both risky, and he also felt, that this evening 'attack' was probably NOT heart related. He decided if the doc thought it wasnt his heart, that the catheterization didnt make sense, and he didnt do it. He had a regular scheduled check up with his cardio in around january, and this time, they did schedule a stress test. He was told that the was a few abnormalities in his stress test, and that they wanted to do a catheter. That was done, and it turned out, they did have to place a new stent, right next to and partially inside of the original stent, as he was told, the original partially collapsed. My question....why would his (bare metal) stent partially collapse? Is it defective? Now I am worried about there being two, connected...and they are at the very end of that artery where it goes into a larger channel that cannot be stented...and Im scared. Any help or advice greatly appreciated. Thank You!

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Stent collapse is very rare indeed, it is far more common for scar tissue or plaque to form in a stent, re-blocking it. Bare metal stents are more prone to allow scar tissue to form, which is why drug eluting stents evolved. The chemical coating on those stents help to inhibit the artery from making scar tissue. I doubt if the stent was defective, it is just that the pressure from the artery was too great (if it indeed collapsed). There are different size stents too, perhaps they chose one which was a bit small for the job. When I had my last 2 stents, they talked me through the procedure as they did it. They explained how techniques in the UK have now changed. They used to base a good long term outcome on 'time' rather than pressure. In other words, it wasn't so important how much they inflated the balloon to squeeze the stent into place, it was believed that the time it was inflated was more important. Now it's the opposite. They inserted stents which were larger than they would have normally used, and used lots of pressure for quite a short period of time. My artery looked huge afterwards but it is believed this allows the heart to have an ability to form collateral vessels more easily. Rest assured though, stent collapse is very rare.