title: The vulnerable atherosclerotic plaque: evaluation of the lipid core in human coronary arteries using morphometry.
abstract: In Greece, mortality due to coronary artery disease has alarmingly increased during the past 3 decades, especially among younger adults between 30 and 40 years old. Many studies have been conducted over the years in an effort to interpret the presence of acute coronary phenomena-myocardial infarction, thrombosis, and sudden death-in early diagnosis and treatment. The current study focuses on postmortem data from individuals who had sudden coronary death. The coronary arteries of 100 individuals who were routinely subjected to autopsy at the Department of Forensic Sciences of the University of Crete were removed and examined, aiming at the evaluation of the degree of stenosis of the lumen and measurement of proportion of cholesterol in the plaque using Image Pro Plus 4.5. The average degree of stenosis was 79.01%, ranging from 11% to 99%. The cholesterol proportion was measured in 66 specimens, and the average was 25.05%, ranging between 5.3% and 66.3%, whereas 25 of them (37.8% overall) were found to contain cholesterol above the average. It resulted that the degree of stenosis was not of major importance in vulnerable plaques and that the amount of cholesterol followed an almost linear pattern of accumulation.
authors.affiliation: Department of Forensic Sciences, Medical School, University of Crete, Greece. apapavdi7@gmail.com
authors.forename: Asteria
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Papavdi
authors.forename: Georgia
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Kornaraki
authors.forename: Antonis
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Nikitakis
authors.forename: Manolis
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Michalodimitrakis
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D002784:Cholesterol / Q000378:metabolism*; D003324:Coronary Artery Disease / Q000473:pathology; D023921:Coronary Stenosis / Q000473:pathology; D003331:Coronary Vessels / Q000378:metabolism* / Q000473:pathology*; D016757:Death, Sudden, Cardiac / Q000209:etiology / Q000473:pathology; D005260:Female; D049429:Forensic Pathology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D058226:Plaque, Atherosclerotic / Q000473:pathology*
chemical_list: D002784:Cholesterol