Low-dose coronary computed tomography angiography using prospective ECG-triggering compared to invasive coronary angiography

To assess the diagnostic accuracy of prospective ECG-triggering 64-slice multidetector computed tomography (MDCT) coronary angiography for evaluation of coronary artery disease (CAD). Forty-two patients (31 males, 11 females, mean age 64 years) underwent cardiac CT and invasive coronary angiography (ICA). Patients with a heart rate of <65 beats/min with stable heart rhythm were included in the study sample. We used a prospective ECG-triggering protocol. Luminal narrowing over 50% was considered to be significant according to a modified 17-segment AHA model, using invasive coronary angiography (ICA) as the standard of reference. The mean radiation dose was 3.5 mSv ± 0.3 (range, 3.3–4.2 mSv), and 542 of 549 segments (98.7%) in the 42 patients were diagnostic. In contrast, 119 of 542 segments (22%) were diagnosed as significant by ICA. The sensitivity, specificity, accuracy, PPV and NPV were 95.0, 96.2, 96, 85.8 and 98.8%, respectively. False positive results were affected by densely calcified plaques, whereas false negatives were caused by motion artifact with poor vessel attenuation at the distal segments or near the bifurcation area of the coronary arteries. Prospective ECG-triggering MDCT is a useful method for evaluating CAD in patients with a lower heart rate with low radiation dose.