Patent ID: 8500794

Claim:
A self expanding flexible stent comprising: a helical strut band helically wound about an axis of said stent, said helical strut band comprising a wave pattern of strut elements, said wave pattern having a plurality of peaks on either side of said wave pattern; and a plurality of coil elements helically wound about an axis of said stent, said coil elements progressing in the same direction as said helical strut band interconnecting at least some of said peaks of a first winding through or near to at least some of said peaks of a second winding of said helical strut band, wherein a geometric relationship triangle is constructed having a first side with a leg length L C being the effective length of said coil element between the interconnected peaks of said first and second winding of said helical strut band, a second side with a leg length being the circumferential distance between said peak of said first winding and said peak of said second winding interconnected by said coil element divided by the sine of an angle A s of said helical strut member from a longitudinal axis of said stent, a third side with a leg length being the longitudinal distance said helical strut band progresses in 1 circumference winding (Pl) minus the effective strut length L S , a first angle of said first leg being 180 degrees minus said angle A s , a second angle of said second leg being an angle A c of said coil element from said longitudinal axis and a third angle of said third leg being said angle A s minus said angle A c , wherein a coil-strut ratio of a ratio of said first leg length L C to a length L S multiplied by the number of adjacent said wave pattern of said strut elements forming said helical strut band, N S is greater than or equal to about 1.