A vascular or endoluminal stent is adapted for deployment in a vessel or tract of a patient to maintain an open lumen. The stent constitutes a scaffold formed from a single open-ended tube having a multiplicity of through-holes in its wall. The through-holes are defined by a plurality of struts that bound the holes. Each of the struts has an optimized cross-section of oval shape with a long diameter generally aligned with the length or circumference of the tube wall and a short diameter generally aligned with the thickness of the tube wall. The oval shape of the struts provide several advantages including enhancing flexibility of the stent, easing advancement of the stent through a lumen of the vessel or tract for deployment at a target site therein, protecting the balloon of a balloon catheter on which the stent is tightly crimped, and enhancing expansion of the stent during deployment while maintaining its capability to withstand compression in response to recoil of the vessel or tract following deployment.