title: Atherosclerotic coronary artery disease: The accuracy of measures to diagnose preclinical atherosclerosis.
abstract: Different methods can be used to diagnose early pre-clinical stage atherosclerosis. The present study was carried out to evaluate the efficiency of these methods. Measures including carotid intima-media thickness (CIMT), pulse wave velocity (PWV), and coronary calcium score (CCS) were evalutated for the detection of coronary artery disease (CAD). We studied the clinical and biochemical profiles of individuals with non-CAD and CAD to assess measures of pre-clinical atherosclerosis. The association between CIMT, PWV and CCS on the one hand, and the coronary atherosclerosis on the other, was studied. In total, 150 cases of cardiovascular disease (CVD) participated in the present study and were subjected to computed tomographic (CT) coronary angiography to divide them into non-CAD (n=100) and CAD (n=50) groups. The patients were also subjected to pre-clinical atherosclerosis tests (CIMT, PWV and CCS). CAD patients had higher CIMT values on both sides (right side, 0.74±0.09 vs. 0.62±0.12 mm; left side, 0.78±0.16 vs. 0.64±0.19 mm; and average, 0.76±0.12 vs. 0.63±0.14 mm; all P-values <0.01). These patients also had significantly higher brachial-ankle PWV (baPWV) on left side (1638.8±372.9 vs. 1498.6±339.8 cm/sec, P<0.001). The overall CCS was significantly increased in CAD patients as compared to the patients without CAD (117.8±118.6 vs. 8.6±18.3, P<0.001). In conclusion, the present study showed that among different measures of preclinical atherosclerosis, CCS had the best diagnostic accuracy. However, the combination of CIMT and baPWV had an excellent negative predictive value for atherosclerotic coronary vascular disease.
authors.affiliation: Department of Cardiology, The Affiliated Xuzhou Hospital of Medical College of Southeast University, Xuzhou, Jiangsu 221009, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Xianchi
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Department of Cardiology, Xuzhou Clinical School of Xuzhou Medical College, Xuzhou, Jiangsu 221009, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Min
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Liu
authors.affiliation: Xuzhou Clinical Medical College of Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Xuzhou, Jiangsu 221009, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Rongrong
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Sun
authors.affiliation: Xuzhou Clinical Medical College of Nanjing University of Chinese Medicine, Xuzhou, Jiangsu 221009, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Yi
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Zeng
authors.affiliation: Department of Cardiology, The Affiliated Xuzhou Hospital of Medical College of Southeast University, Xuzhou, Jiangsu 221009, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Shuang
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: Department of Cardiology, The Affiliated Xuzhou Hospital of Medical College of Southeast University, Xuzhou, Jiangsu 221009, P.R. China.
authors.forename: Peiying
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Zhang
keywords: cardiovascular disease; carotid intima media thickness; coronary calcium score; hypertension; pulse wave velocity