The answer to the question I posed in a previous Letter to the Editor [1] is Charles T. Dotter-surpirse, surprise, surprise! Perhaps by giving the answer myself, if there is any argument it will now happen. Most of us prefer to disagree, rather than put an answer forward.
Although in Dotter and Judkins's original article [2] on ''dottering'' they alluded to the promise of these endovascular devices, they termed them ''a manually guided dilator'' or ''. . . a device suitable for percutaneous insertion, which is a functional equivalent of the present spring guide but capable of externally controlled concentric expansion over a suitable portion of its length.'' However, Dotter et al.'s article in Radiology in April 1983, was titled ''Transluminal Expandable Nitinol Stent Grafting: Preliminary Report'' [3]. Now, having satisfied the interventionalists, what about the etymologists? Sylvester Sterioff [4] has carefully researched the origin of the word, stated that Dotter et al. [3] first used the word, and, furthermore, Sterioff is satisfied that the word is indeed named after the dentist Charles T. Stent.
I agree with Sterioff that it is an appealing word. He states ''. . . The word is monosyllabic, emphatic in its expression with internally alliterative, hard-sounding consonants, and has no other modern cognates.'' There is another possible origin of the word (Moore, personal communication). The Oxford English Dictionary lists a number of other meanings to the word stent: (1) an assessment of property for the purposes of taxation; 92) tin mining rubble; (3) a stake for setting out fishing nets in a river; and (4) to extend or set (a sail, curtain, tent, etc.) in its proper position. Most of these forms are Scot or obsolete and are derived from the Old French estente meaning ''extent.'' But, all the evidence has it that Charles T. Stent gave his name to our coronary endovascular prosthesis (the stent) and Charles T. Dotter was the first to use the name in a publication!