Patent ID: 8715771

Claim:
A method of coating a plurality of stents comprising: a. providing a plurality of pre-screen stents and a plurality of manufacturing build stents, wherein the plurality of pre-screen stents comprises at least two groups of stents and each group has at least two members; b. applying a drug coating to the pre-screen stents and the manufacturing build stents; c. applying further top coats to only the pre-screen stents, wherein each group of pre-screen stents receives a different number of topcoats than another group receives; d. loading the coated pre-screen stents on catheters to form pre-screen stent and catheter assemblies; e. sterilizing the loaded pre-screen stent and catheter assemblies; f. testing each group of sterilized stents to determine a final number of topcoats necessary to achieve a particular desired release rate; g. applying the final number of top coats to the previously drug coated manufacturing build stents to form completed manufacturing build stents; h. loading the coated manufacturing build stents on catheters to form manufacturing build stent and catheter assemblies; and i. sterilizing the completed manufacturing build stents.