Tag Archives: coronary artery disease

Introduction Left pleuropericardial agenesis is a developmental abnormality that results in the heart and the left lung sharing a common coelomic cavity. This abnormality manifests due to failure of mesodermal ingrowth from the lateral body wall to close off the left pleuropericardial canal and also the failure of development of the left pleuropericardial membrane. Although pre-operative diagnosis is very unusual, partial agenesis can precipitate catastrophic complications of chamber or appendage incarceration. Complete agenesis results in incompletely understood effects on the right ventricular geometry due to luxation of heart into an extre

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The objective of this study was to look at how well patients with coronary artery disease are managed, and whether community-based angina clinics might be an alternative, or even more beneficial, to these patients compared with hospital-based clinics. Patients with coronary artery disease need regular follow-ups to review their lifestyle and medications, and to ensure angina symptoms are well controlled. Heart rates should be checked regularly as high heart rate is associated with increased risk of myocardial ischaemia. In this study, 41 patients with coronary artery disease were assessed at a community-based angina clinic. Our results showe

Introduction Very elderly individuals are the fastest growing segment of most Western populations, with those aged 80 and older projected to triple in number by the middle of this century.1,2 The prevalence of coronary artery disease is high in this age group, and diagnostic investigations are being used with increasing frequency when angina is poorly controlled by medical therapy. However, due to more extensive disease and less functional reserve, invasive investigations have a higher complication rate in the very elderly than in younger patients.3 Therefore, non-invasive tests that identify those patients most likely to benefit from invasiv

Introduction Coronary artery disease (CAD) forms the bulk of adult cardiology. Spectacular advances have been made in the diagnosis and treatment of CAD, but the diagnostic terminology has not kept pace with these developments. The babel of terms like Q-wave infarction, non-Q infarction, ST elevation infarction, non-ST elevation infarction, etc. does not reflect the present-day realities. The term ‘acute coronary syndrome’ is too vague. A case of acute myocardial infarction successfully reperfused is no longer an ‘infarction’. There is a need to describe these cases of ‘aborted infarctions’ and ‘threatened infarctions’.1 A pro

Introduction Renal artery stenosis (RAS), traditionally the preserve of the nephrologist, is a condition of increasing interest to the cardiologist. Ninety per cent of RAS is caused by atherosclerosis and the risk factors for renal atherosclerosis and coronary atherosclerosis are the same. Furthermore, the presence of RAS alters the prognosis of co-existent cardiac disease, most notably cardiac failure and ischaemic heart disease, both directly1–3 and via its sequelae of renal failure and hypertension. Finally, the treatments for the disease, both medical and interventional, are familiar to the cardiologist, who can employ much of the knowl

Introduction The use of ionising radiation within cardiology is widespread with both myocardial perfusion scintigraphy (MPS) and conventional invasive coronary angiography (CA) being common diagnostic investigations for coronary artery disease. In the UK, some 70,000 MPS were performed in 20001 and over 205,000 CA in 2005.2 The use of ionising radiation is likely to increase further with the advent of cardiac multi-detector X-ray computed tomography (MDCT) and X-ray computed tomographic angiography (CTA). Furthermore, all these investigations are deemed to involve moderate- or high-dose radiation.3 Previous studies have shown poor knowledge o

In recent years technological advances have enabled improvements in both temporal and spatial resolution such that multi-detector computed tomography (MDCT) is now able to reproducibly evaluate cardiac disease. The combination of this improved resolution with more advanced post-processing techniques now means that MDCT has the ability to perform both anatomical and functional assessment from the single study. This technique therefore not only provides a non-invasive alternative to conventional angiography but the same data-set allows concurrent assessment of cardiac function, assessment of aberrant vessels, graft patency studies and assessmen

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