B. Lu et al., Detection and analysis of intracoronary artery stent after PTCA using contrast-enhanced three-dimensional electron beam tomography, J INVAS CAR, 12(1), 2000, pp. 1-6
We evaluated several three-dimensional methods of contrast-enhanced electro
n beam tomography (EBT) for evaluation of intracoronary stent characteristi
cs after percutaneous transluminal coronary angioplasty (PTCA). Twenty-six
patients who had undergone PTCA and stenting (31 stents) were investigated
by using contrast-enhanced, electrocardiographically (ECG) triggered EBT sc
anning. EBT results were compared with conventional selective coronary arte
riography (SCA). Overall, 27 intracoronary stents had been identified on EB
T images (87.1%), while 4 stents could not be evaluated because of impaired
image quality. EBT correctly identified the only case in which there was a
residual stenosis at the distal portion of the stent. As compared with SCA
results, EBT showed an over-estimation of intracoronary stent diameter (p
< 0.001) and accurate measurement on the visualized length of the stents (p
> 0.05). Fifty Hu, 100 Hu and 150 Hu were used as the observed window leve
ls on three-dimensional (3-D) images; the accuracy for stent assessment inc
reased with ascending window levels, EBT can reliably characterize coronary
artery stents and may become a useful non-invasive method for patency eval
uation of stented coronary segments after PTCA.