In his talk, Dr. Michael Hope from the University of California, San Francisco will explain how advanced techniques can improve the risk stratification of aortic disease.
"Functional and molecular aortic imaging has shown great promise for evaluation of aortic disease, and it may soon augment conventional assessment of aortic dimensions for the clinical management of patients," Hope wrote in an email to AuntMinnie.com.
Among the many techniques that will be discussed, MRI blood-flow imaging can identify atherosclerosis-prone regions of the aorta and may help predict aneurysm growth. Computational modeling can reveal significant differences in wall stress between abdominal aortic aneurysms of similar size, and may improve rupture prediction.
Meanwhile, imaging with FDG-PET can identify focal aortic wall inflammation that may predict rapid disease progression. And molecular imaging with probes that target collagen and elastin can reveal changes in the vessel wall associated with disease.
