Intimal thickness is not associated with wall shear stress patterns in the human right coronary artery.
OBJECTIVE
Low wall shear stress has been implicated in atherogenesis throughout the arterial tree, including the right coronary artery (RCA). The objective of this study was to determine the level of covariation of intimal thickness and wall shear stress in the human RCA.


RESULTS
Postmortem histological measurements of intimal thickness were compared with wall shear stresses calculated from computational flow modeling in 4 human right coronary arteries. A statistically significant correlation between intimal thickness and wall shear stress was found in only 1 of the 4 arteries studied.


CONCLUSIONS
Wall shear stress does not appear to be related to intimal thickness in the 4 RCAs studied.
Joshi
Anil K
AK
Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, University of Toronto, Ontario, Canada.
Leask
Richard L
RL
Myers
Jerry G
JG
Ojha
Matadial
M
Butany
Jagdish
J
Ethier
C Ross
CR
D000328:Adult; D001344:Autopsy; D003331:Coronary Vessels / Q000473:pathology*; D005260:Female; D006321:Heart; D006439:Hemodynamics / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D008955:Models, Cardiovascular; D009206:Myocardium / Q000473:pathology; D011673:Pulsatile Flow / Q000502:physiology; D012039:Regional Blood Flow / Q000502:physiology; D013314:Stress, Mechanical; D017539:Tunica Intima / Q000473:pathology*