Radiology: CCTA offers prognostic value past diagnosis
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While previous research has focused on CCTA as a test to identify coronary artery disease, the prognostic value of CCTA data in acute chest pain patients in whom ACS has already been ruled out remained unknown, according to John W. Nance, Jr., MD, of Medical University of South Carolina in Charleston, and colleagues.
To evaluate the incremental predictive value of CCTA in these patients, the authors looked at 458 patients with acute chest pain who underwent coronary artery calcium (CAC) assessment with CCTA. Patients who did not experience ACS at hospitalization were followed for myocardial infarct, revascularization or other MACEs.
Results showed that patients with no plaque at CCTA remained free of MACEs during a 13 month follow-up, while 5 percent of the patients with no calcium had MACE. The extent of plaque was the strongest predictor of MACE independent of traditional risk factors, with a hazard ratio of 151.77 for patients with four or more segments containing plaque compared with those without plaque. Patients with mixed plaque were more likely to experience an event than those with only noncalcified plaque or exclusively calcified plaque.
“In our study, the extent of total plaque was the single most predictive cardiac CT angiographic measure for the occurrence of future MACE, while assessment of CAC was clearly inferior,” summed the authors.
While the presence of mixed plaque had strong predictive value over exclusively calcified or noncalcified plaque, Nance and colleagues found no significant differences between patients with either calcified or noncalcified plaque. The authors speculated this may be because patients with exclusively noncalcified plaque may be at an early stage of atherosclerotic disease, while calcified plaque indicates a later stage with more stabilized atherosclerotic plaque burden.
The authors noted their finding that the absence of CAC does not exclude future adverse events is in line with the results of previous population-based studies. “These observations might indicate that CAC is not a prerequisite for disease morbidity and might suggest that exclusively noncalcified plaque has the ability to manifest itself clinically independent of CAC.”
All patients in the current study were at a low to intermediate risk for coronary artery disease, and the authors indicated that the incremental prognostic value of CCTA will have to be further studied in asymptomatic high-risk individuals.
Evan Godt, Writer
Evan joined TriMed in 2011, writing primarily for Health Imaging. Prior to diving into medical journalism, Evan worked for the Nine Network of Public Media in St. Louis. He also has worked in public relations and education. Evan studied journalism at the University of Missouri, with an emphasis on broadcast media.