BACKGROUND Atherosclerosis is the primary cause of coronary artery disease (CAD). There is increasing recognition that lesion composition rather than size determines the acute complications of atherosclerotic disease. Low serum adiponectin levels were reported to be associated with coronary artery disease and future incidence of acute coronary syndrome (ACS). The impact of adiponectin on lesion...

BACKGROUND High-speed rotational atherectomy uses a diamond-coated, elliptical burr to abrade occlusive atherosclerosis, especially noncompliant calcified plaque. METHODS AND RESULTS Intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) was used to analyze 28 patients after atherectomy. Arteries treated and imaged were left main (three), left anterior descending (12), left circumflex (five), right coronary (seven)...

BACKGROUND Material decomposition of dual-energy computed tomography (DECT) enables subtraction of calcified plaque. PURPOSE To evaluate the accuracy of lumen area measurement in calcified plaque by subtraction of DECT and to determine the effect of contrast material concentration, lumen diameter, density, and thickness of calcified plaque for the measurement. MATERIAL AND METHODS Vessel ph...

Introduction: Navigator coronary MR angiography (CMRA) with steady-state free precession (SSFP) demonstrated good diagnostic accuracy of assessing coronary significant stenosis [1], but evaluation of the modality in detecting coronary atherosclerotic plaques was not reported. The purpose of this study was to investigate the ability of navigator CMRA wih SSFP in detecting coronary plaque with re...

BACKGROUND Identification of coronary plaque composition is important for selecting the treatment strategy, and 64-slice computed tomography (CT) is a noninvasive method of characterizing atherosclerotic plaques. However, the correlation between plaque characteristics detected by CT and intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) is not clear. A 40 MHz IVUS imaging system (iMap-IVUS) has recently been deve...

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE Calcified arterial plaque has been proposed as a subclinical marker of atherosclerosis. We compared it to a well-validated surrogate--carotid intimal medial thickness (IMT). METHODS Calcified arterial plaque was measured in 2 vascular beds (coronary and carotid) by computed tomography, and common carotid artery IMT was measured by B-mode ultrasonography, in 438 particip...

BACKGROUND Data on coronary plaque observations on multi-slice computed tomography (MSCT) in patients with type 2 diabetes are scarce. METHODS AND RESULTS In total, 60 patients (19 with diabetes) underwent 64-slice MSCT, followed by conventional coronary angiography with intravascular ultrasound (IVUS). Non-invasively, the extent of coronary atherosclerosis and 3 plaque types (non-calcified, ...

OBJECTIVES The role of inflammation in atherosclerosis is widely appreciated. High mobility group box 1 (HMGB1), an injury-associated molecular pattern molecule acting as a mediator of inflammation, has recently been implicated in the development of atherosclerosis. In this study, we sought to investigate the association of plasma HMGB1 with coronary plaque composition in patients with suspecte...

BACKGROUND Coronary computed tomographic angiography (CCTA) facilitates comprehensive evaluation of coronary artery disease (CAD), including plaque characterization, and can provide additive diagnostic value to single-photon emission computed tomography (SPECT). However, data regarding the incremental prognostic value of CCTA to SPECT remain sparse. We evaluated the independent and incremental ...