Endoprosthesis with stress reducing features

A method of making an endoprosthesis configured to shift between a collapsed configuration and an expanded configuration, comprising:

• knitting a tubular scaffold from a single filament, the tubular scaffold including a plurality of rows of loops and a plurality of rows of rungs arranged around a central longitudinal axis in an alternating fashion;
• heating setting the tubular scaffold in the expanded configuration;
• after the heat setting step, removing medial portions of a plurality of rows of loops and medial portions of rows of rungs immediately adjacent to the plurality of rows of loops to form a plurality of cutout regions;
• and
• after the removing step, applying a polymeric covering to the tubular scaffold.

A method of making an endoprosthesis configured to shift between a collapsed configuration and an expanded configuration, comprising:

• forming a braided or knitted tubular scaffold;
• heating setting the tubular scaffold in the expanded configuration;
• after the heat setting step, removing a medial portion of the tubular scaffold to form a cutout region, the cutout region being axially spaced apart from a proximal end of the tubular scaffold and axially spaced apart from a distal end of the tubular scaffold;
• and
• after the removing step, applying a polymeric covering to the tubular scaffold.