Significance of Automated Stenosis Detection During Quantitative Angiography Insights Gained From Intracoronary Ultrasound Imaging

Background Automated stenosis analysis is a common feature of commercially available quantitative coronary angiography (QCA) systems, allowing automatic detection of the boundaries of the stenosis, interpolation of the expected dimensions of the coronary vessel at the point of obstruction, and angiographically derived estimation of atheromatous plaque size. However, the ultimate meaning of this type of analysis in terms of the degree of underlying atherosclerotic disease remains unclear. We investigated the relationship between stenosis analysis performed with QCA and the underlying degree of atherosclerotic disease judged by intracoronary ultrasound (ICUS) imaging. Methods and Results In 40 coronary stenoses, automated identification of the sites of maximal luminal obstruction and the start of the stenosis was performed with QCA by use of curvature analysis of the obtained diameter function. Plaque size at these locations also was estimated with ICUS, with an additional ICUS measurement immediately proxi...