Studies confirm reliability of combined protocol for chest pain assessment
In recent studies at Munich University, the combined Dual Source CT protocol for chest pain assessment showed a high sensitivity for the cause of chest pain. Due to its robust image quality even in high heart rates DSCT greatly improves diagnostic accuracy.
In cases of acute chest pain, the initial focus of the examination should be to rule out acutely life-threatening conditions. The DSCT protocol for chest pain assessment combines the evaluation of myocardial infarction, aortic dissection and pulmonary embolism in one single examination.
Clinical studies confirm successful and reliable patient triage with DSCT
A recent initial study(1) evaluating chest pain assessment with this combined protocol in 47 patients confirmed that a robust image quality can be obtained even in acutely ill patients with high heart rates.
Regarding the diagnostic accuracy, the fact that no case of relevant coronary artery disease was missed in CT confirms that the method is reliable in the exclusion of coronary artery disease and can be very helpful for a fast patient triage.
A second clinical trial(2) showed similar results in a group of 109 patients. The pathologies revealed by DS-CTA were distributed quite evenly over the different vascular territories of the chest. They included
- pulmonary embolism in 10 patients,
- coronary stenoses or occlusions in 24 and
- aortic dissections, aneurysms or ruptures in 14 patients.
Additionally, DSCT showed valvular or myocardial disease in 14 patients. Regarding correlation to catheter angiography in 30 patients and a 3-months follow-up in all as gold standard, sensitivity for the cause of chest pain was 98%.
See corresponding news: Chest pain assessment
See corresponding protocol: Extended chest pain
1 Johnson TR, Nikolaou K, Fink C, Becker A, Knez A, Rist C, Reiser MF, Becker CR (2007) Dual-source CT in chest pain diagnosis. Radiologe 47(4):301-309
2 Johnson TR, Nikolaou K, Becker A, Leber AW, Rist C, Wintersperger BJ, Reiser MF, Becker CR (2007) Dual Source CT for Chest Pain Assessment Eur Radiol
