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Coronary artery calcium scanning finds the risk of myocardial infarction and sudden death accurately enough to guide the selection of diagnostic tests for symptomatic patients.

Coronary artery calcium scanning predicts the risk of myocardial infarction and sudden death accurately enough to guide the selection of diagnostic tests for symptomatic patients, according to a multicenter prospective study.

The Early Identification of Subclinical Atherosclerosis by Noninvasive Imaging Research (EISNER) study, led by Leslee J. Shaw, Ph.D., at Emory University in Atlanta, also indicates the multislice CT -based calcium tests can be used without triggering unnecessary exams or expense.

Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center and Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, both in Los Angeles, St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital and Weill Cornell Medical College, both in New York City, and the University of California at Irvine participated in the study. Findings appeared in the Sept. 29 issue of the Journal of the American College of Cardiology.

The findings of the EISNER study provide the first direct evidence that coronary artery calcium scanning could be an acceptable, cost-effective screening test for coronary artery disease, since it is able to identify high-risk subgroups in need of aggressive medical treatment, according to senior investigator Dr. Daniel S. Berman, chief of cardiac imaging at Cedars-Sinai.

Source: ACC

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