Diagnosis of coronary artery disease using thallium imaging: tomographic versus planar imaging

Coronary artery disease was evaluated with tomographic and planar thallium imaging in 31 subjects who had undergone coronary angiography for assessment of chest pain syndrome. Coronary arteriography revealed significant coronary artery disease in 17; and 14 had normal coronary arteries. The sensitivity and specificity for planar imaging was 71% and 79%, and that for tomography, 94% and 79% respectively. The sensitivity and specificity figures for individual coronary artery lesion detection for planar imaging were 87/83 for LAD, 33/100 for LCX and 50/86 for RCA respectively, and for tomography the figures were 87/87 for LAD, 33/95 for LCX and 90/76 for RCA respectively. The use of coronary arteriography as a gold standard was considered by assessing its interobserver variability, which was 16%. The interobserver variability for thallium imaging was 8% and 3% respectively for tomographic and planar acquisitions.