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It is not hyperbole to say that lumen-apposing metal stents (LAMS) have revolutionized the endoscopic drainage and debridement of pancreatic fluid collections, including both pseudocysts and walled-off pancreatic necrosis. With their easier and faster placement, LAMS have largely supplanted plastic stents in this setting, but the relative efficacy of these two stent types is still unclear.
In a recent prospective, randomized study, researchers compared the efficacy of plastic stents versus LAMS for use in treating walled-off necrosis in 60 patients. At 6 months' follow-up, they found no significant difference in the primary outcome of number of procedures performed to achieve treatment success (median, 2 for LAMS and 3 for plastic stents; ra…