HEART CALCIUM SCORE
What is the best way to determine if someone, who has no symptoms, is at risk for a heart attack or stroke? The best test might still be the best kept secret in medicine. Electron Beam CT (EBCT) uses CAT scan technology to look inside the coronary arteries to detect calcium in the coronary artery. ECBTs have been used, albeit in relatively speaking sparse fashion, for over a half a decade now. There is a growing body of evidence that shows that an ECBT can be useful for detecting those at risk for cardiovascular disease. The latest research combines the data from several studies and confirms that the ECBT is a better predictor of heart disease than other more established tests like blood pressure measurement.
“I had some chest pains and my doctor sent me for an angiogram.”
Frank Dignon’s body told him loud and clear there was trouble brewing in his coronary arteries. “They put me in for a triple, and they wound up doing a quadruple bypass,” he says. But unlike Frank, millions of Americans have cardiovascular disease which goes undetected. They’re not worked up because they don’t have the symptoms Frank had, setting them up for a sudden cardiac arrest.
Now, new research in the Archives of Internal Medicine combines the data of several studies on EBCT, and it shows unquestionably, EBCT is an excellent independent predictor of who will have a cardiovascular event, such as a heart attack or a stroke.
This is an appropriate screening test for patients at intermediate risk for coronary artery disease,” says Dr. Allen Guerci, Chief Executive Officer of St. Francis Hospital in New York and EBCT researcher.
EBCT gets accurate pictures of the coronary arteries. If it lights up white, that means there is calcium in the coronary artery. And the only thing that can cause calcium in the coronary artery is a cholesterol plaque clogging the artery. The more severe the calcium deposition in the coronary artery, the greater the risk to the individual. Someone with even the smallest amounts of calcium in the coronary artery is at twice the risk of a heart attack than are those with no calcium in the arteries.
“This test can be lifesaving and I think that every middle aged person whose doctor is contemplating starting a cholesterol lowering medicine should get this test first,” says Dr. Guerci.
Not only does ECBT detect someone who is at higher risk, it can even help someone who may be on cholesterol lowering medicine, but is in fact not at risk. A substantial percentage of people taking those medicines, at least 10 or 20 percent, don’t need them. EBCT costs between $350 to $500 a test. That’s less than the cost of a year’s supply of many cholesterol-lowering medicines.
Most importantly, though, by detecting those at risk, hopefully ECBT can prevent advanced cardiovascular disease, as it did in Frank’s case. Fortunately, bypass surgery got him back into action and he feels fine now.
“So far my cardiologist gives me a clean bill,” says Frank.