Feinberg
Northwestern Medicine | Northwestern University | Faculty Profiles

News Center

  • Categories
    • Campus News
    • Disease Discoveries
    • Clinical Breakthroughs
    • Education News
    • Scientific Advances
  • Press Releases
  • Media Coverage
  • Podcasts
  • Editor’s Picks
    • COVID-19
    • Cardiology
    • Cancer
    • Neurology and Neuroscience
    • Aging and Longevity
    • Artificial Intelligence in Medicine
  • News Archives
  • About Us
    • Media Contact
    • Share Your News
    • News Feeds
    • Social Media
    • Contact Us
Menu
  • Categories
    • Campus News
    • Disease Discoveries
    • Clinical Breakthroughs
    • Education News
    • Scientific Advances
  • Press Releases
  • Media Coverage
  • Podcasts
  • Editor’s Picks
    • COVID-19
    • Cardiology
    • Cancer
    • Neurology and Neuroscience
    • Aging and Longevity
    • Artificial Intelligence in Medicine
  • News Archives
  • About Us
    • Media Contact
    • Share Your News
    • News Feeds
    • Social Media
    • Contact Us
Home » Heart Scans Can Help Flag High-Risk Heart Patients
Uncategorized

Heart Scans Can Help Flag High-Risk Heart Patients

By medwebApr 29, 2010
Share
Facebook Twitter Email

New Evidence That Heart Scans Can Help Flag High-Risk Heart Patients

Every year, thousands of people get heart scans that provide pictures of calcium deposits in their coronary arteries. Studies have shown that the coronary artery calcium score (CACS) can point to signs of atherosclerosis and predict future heart attacks.

A new Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine study shows for the first time that using the CACS while also considering traditional risk factors for heart disease is a better method than using traditional predictors alone to predict future heart attacks.

“Almost one-quarter of the people in the study who had heart attacks were considered intermediate risk based on traditional risk factors alone, but were considered high risk once we included their CACS,” said lead author Tamar Polonsky, MD, post-doctoral fellow in cardiovascular epidemiology and prevention at Feinberg.

Polonsky, senior author Philip Greenland, MD, Harry W. Dingman professor of cardiology at Feinberg, and a team of researchers explain their discovery in a paper to be published April 28 in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Beginning in July 2000, more than 6,000 volunteers from the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA), a population-based cohort, were evaluated for heart disease risk using traditional risk factors and the CACS test. The volunteers, between the ages of 45 and 84, identified themselves as white, black, Hispanic or Chinese. The volunteers had no known cardiovascular disease.

Researchers tried to predict the risk of future coronary heart disease events in the volunteers in two ways. They predicted who would have an event by using their traditional risk factors alone: age, gender, tobacco use, blood pressure, antihypertensive medication use, cholesterol levels, and race/ethnicity. Then, they predicted who would have an event by evaluating traditional factors plus CACS, and compared which method did a better job of predicting who would experience a heart attack or serious chest pain.

Nearly six years later, 209 of the participants had some type of coronary heart disease event. When looking at the risk levels of those who experienced an event, researchers found that the CACS was key in classifying people in the most extreme categories.

“Ours is the first study to show that the CACS test, applied in a large population, actually puts more people who experience events in the high-risk category and more people who do not have events in the low-risk category,” said Greenland. “So the test is effective. It sorts people properly.”

Getting your CACS is not without additional cost — it is rarely covered by insurance — and there are risks.

“It is a test that has radiation exposure — about the same as two mammograms,” Greenland said. “It is not a test your family doctor can do in the office when you do your blood work. You would have to go to a separate radiology clinic.”

While the study suggests that a CACS could help doctors better identify people who would benefit from more aggressive treatment of their risk factors or who might be able to hold off on starting medication, Greenland said more research needs to be done before the test is routinely recommended.

Share. Facebook Twitter Email

Related Posts

Mar 29, 2023

Adolescent Sexual Health Program Receives Funding for Social Marketing Campaign

Mar 29, 2023

Lurie Cancer Center Receives Merit Extension from NCI

Oct 20, 2021

Drug Combination May Reduce Risk of Leukemia Relapse

Mar 26, 2020

Comments are closed.

Latest News

Evolving Telehealth Research and its Place in Healthcare Delivery 

Dec 8, 2023

Global Health Day Highlights Pandemic, HIV Research

Dec 8, 2023

AI May Spare Breast Cancer Patients Unnecessary Treatments

Dec 7, 2023

Drug Extends Survival in Prostate Cancer with Genetic Mutations  

Dec 6, 2023

Pioneering Biochemist Craig Crews Named Winner of 2024 Kimberly Prize

Dec 5, 2023
  • News Center Home
  • Categories
  • Press Release
  • Media Coverage
  • Editor’s Picks
  • News Archives
  • About Us
Flickr Photos
2023-Sim-Open-House_161
2023-Sim-Open-House_127
2023-Sim-Open-House_108
2023-Sim-Open-House_106
2023-Sim-Open-House_118
2023-Sim-Open-House_068
2023-Sim-Open-House_069
2023-Sim-Open-House_027
2023-Sim-Open-House_155
2023-Sim-Open-House_161
2023-Sim-Open-House_127
2023-Sim-Open-House_108

Northwestern University logo

Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine

RSS Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Flickr YouTube Instagram
Copyright © 2023 Northwestern University
  • Contact Northwestern University
  • Disclaimer
  • Campus Emergency Information
  • Policy Statements

Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.