Ultrasound assessment of brachial endothelial vasomotor function in addition to carotid plaque echolucency for predicting cardiovascular events in patients with coronary artery disease.

BACKGROUND: Single assessment of either flow-mediated vasodilatation of the brachial artery (FMD) or carotid plaque echolucency provides prognostic information for both cerebrovascular and coronary events.

OBJECTIVES: This study tested the hypothesis that combined assessment using carotid plaque echolucency and FMD may have an additive effect when predicting cardiovascular events in patients with coronary artery disease (CAD).

METHODS: Ultrasound assessment of carotid plaque echolucency with integrated backscatter (IBS) analysis (calibrated IBS=intima-media IBS value-adventitia IBS) and FMD was performed in 547 consecutive patients with CAD. All the study patients were followed up prospectively for a period of ≤ 60 months until the occurrence of one of the following cardiovascular events: cardiac death, non-fatal myocardial infarction, unstable angina requiring coronary revascularization, or ischemic stroke.

RESULTS: During a mean follow-up period of 52 ± 10 months, 69 cardiovascular events occurred. A multivariate Cox proportional hazard model after 1000 bootstrapped resampling demonstrated that calibrated IBS and FMD were significant, independent predictors of future cardiovascular events after adjustment for known risk factors (calibrated IBS, HR 0.88, 95% CI 0.83-0.93; FMD, HR 0.76, 95% CI 0.68-0.85). The c-statistics, net reclassification improvement (NRI), and integrated discrimination improvement (IDI) analyses showed that the combination of calibrated IBS and FMD values had a greater incremental effect on the predictive value of known risk factors for cardiovascular events.

CONCLUSIONS: Combined assessment of brachial endothelial function and carotid plaque echolucency is an independent predictor of cardiovascular events and improves risk prediction when added to known risks.