Dear AuntMinnie Member,
Could coronary CT angiography (CTA) serve as a prognostic tool for predicting which symptomatic patients are at risk of dying from a heart attack? The question was posed by U.S. group presenting its research last weekend at Stanford University's International Symposium on Multidetector-Row CT.
It is a crucial question, as the other commonly used prognostic tools for cardiac imaging -- calcium scoring and SPECT -- have drawbacks. To date, few studies have been done to assess whether coronary CTA might offer a better alternative, according to staff writer Eric Barnes, writing for our Cardiac Imaging Digital Community.
The study found that coronary CTA was strongly correlated with all-cause mortality in more than 1,000 patients, and that those with more extensive coronary artery disease at CTA were incrementally more likely to succumb during the follow-up period. The scans also had a high negative predictive value: patients with symptoms but no detectable disease at CTA were very likely to keep on living.
If the results are validated in future studies, they could help shift cardiac imaging's paradigm from a focus on intervention to one based on prevention, the researchers believe.
Get more details by clicking here, or visit our Cardiac Imaging Digital Community at cardiac.auntminnie.com.
In other happenings at AuntMinnie.com, we've just launched a new survey in collaboration with Medilink Consulting Group on how imaging centers are coping with the impact of the Deficit Reduction Act (DRA) of 2005. We plan to use your (anonymous) responses in an upcoming article on the DRA, so your participation is needed! You can reach the survey by clicking here.
