The role of percutaneous coronary interventions in addition to medical 
therapy for patients with stable coronary artery disease continues to be
 debated in routine clinical practice, despite more than 2 decades of 
randomized controlled trials. The residual uncertainty arises from 
particular challenges facing revascularization trials. Which endpoint do
 doctors care about, and which do patients care about? Which 
participants should be enrolled? What background medical therapy should 
we use? When is placebo control relevant? In this paper, we discuss how 
these questions can be approached and examine the merits and 
disadvantages of possible options. Engaging multiple stakeholders, 
including patients, researchers, regulators, and funders, to ensure the 
design elements are methodologically valid and clinically meaningful 
should be an aspirational goal in the development of future trials.