Model Reduction Strategies Enable Computational Analysis of Controlled Drug Release from Cardiovascular Stents

Medicated cardiovascular stents, also called drug eluting stents (DES), represent a relevant application of controlled drug release mechanisms. Modeling of drug release from DES also represents a challenging problem for theoretical and computational analysis. In particular, the study of drug release involves models with singular behavior, arising, for instance, in the analysis of drug release in the small diffusion regime. Moreover, the application to realistic stent configurations requires one to account for complex designs of the device. To efficiently obtain satisfactory simulations of DES we rely on a multiscale strategy, based on lumped parameter (0D) models to account for drug release, one dimensional (1D) models to efficiently handle complex stent patterns and fully three-dimensional (3D) models for drug transfer in the artery, including the lumen and the arterial wall. The application of these advanced mathematical models makes it possible to perform a computational analysis of the fluid dynamics and drug release for a medicated stent implanted into a coronary bifurcation, a treatment where clinical complications still have to be fully understood.