Cook Incorporated to Release Drug-Eluting Coronary Stent Clinical Data Next Week.

Business & Health/Medical Editors

BLOOMINGTON, Ind.--(BW HealthWire)--Sept. 7, 2001

Cook(R) Incorporated, the only company with clinical experience treating heart disease patients in Asia, Europe and North America with drug-eluting coronary stents, will present clinical data from its Asian-based ASPECT trial of paclitaxel-coated coronary stents Friday, Sept. 14 at 5:45 p.m. EDT during the Transcatheter Cardiovascular Therapeutics (TCT) conference in Washington, D.C.

Key results from this study will be made public during a media information session on Thursday, Sept. 13, starting at 10:30 a.m.

Cook also will report six-month clinical and angiographic results from a pilot study of in-stent restenosis in 23 patients on Tuesday, September 11, at 5:00 p.m. and will discuss other relevant studies and trials during the TCT meeting.

The following paclitaxel-related presentations involving Cook have been scheduled at TCT:

-- Tuesday, 9/11/01, 11:35 a.m.: Dr. Alan Heldman on "Paclitaxel and Taxane
Derivatives: Pre-clinical Studies -- Evaluation of Dosing, Efficacy and
Toxicity"

-- Tuesday, 9/11/01, 4:45 p.m.: Dr. Ivan De Scheerder on "Taxol -- Results of
the ELUTES Study"

-- Tuesday, 9/11/01, 5:00 p.m.: Dr. De Scheerder on "Treatment of In-Stent
Restenosis with a Taxol Coated Stent: Six-Month Clinical and Angiographic
Results in 23 Patients"

-- Tuesday, 9/11/01, 5:55 p.m.: Dr. Anthony Gershlick and Dr. De Scheerder are
panelists on Q & A session: "The Present and Future of Local Drug Delivery"

-- Thursday, 9/13/01, 10:35 a.m.: Dr. Seung-Jung Park presents an overview of
ASPECT trial data at TCT's media information session

-- Friday, 9/14/01, 5:45 p.m.: Dr. Seung-Jung Park presents six-month
angiographic and IVUS results of the ASPECT trial in the Late Breaking Clinical
Trials session

In other developments, Cook announced that the full-scale U.S. clinical trial of its Logic PTX paclitaxel-coated coronary stent trial will enroll two groups, a cohort of 1,200 elective patients and a second group of 450 in-stent restenosis patients at 50 sites. This randomized, prospective, double-blinded study, which has been named PATENCY, will evaluate the safety and efficacy of a single dose of paclitaxel. Cook Incorporated's drug-eluting coronary stents are investigational devices that are not cleared for sale in the United States.

Following TCT, the next presentation of clinical data from Cook's drug-eluting stent development program will come at the American Heart Association meeting in November. Dr. Anthony Gershlick will present six-month angiographic data from the 180-patient European ELUTES study on Monday, November 12, during the Late Breaking Clinical Trials session from 10:45 a.m. to noon. Dr. Won Heum Shim, Dr. Park and Dr. De Scheerder also will present follow-up data from their trials during the AHA meeting.

With international headquarters in Bloomington, Ind., privately held COOK(R) (www.cookgroup.com/) is a leading designer, manufacturer and global distributor of minimally invasive medical device technology for diagnostic and therapeutic procedures. Since its founding in 1963, COOK has been committed to product innovation, skilled hand-craftsmanship and unsurpassed customer satisfaction, earning the company global recognition among medical professionals. Cook Incorporated is acknowledged as an innovator in catheter technology, wire guides, introducer needles and sheaths, stents and stent-grafts, embolization coils, drainage catheters, tissue-engineered medical biomaterials, vena cava filters, implanted cardiac lead extraction technology and other minimally invasive devices. More than 40 companies in the United States, Europe, Canada, Australia and Asia design, produce, manufacture and distribute COOK brand medical devices to physicians and other medical professionals around the world.