Plaque Lipid Quantification and Correlation with Blood Lipid Indices
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Vascular characterisation using multimodal imaging and relationship to functional lipid and inflammation indices in blood
IRAS ID
178653
Contact name
Robin Choudhury
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
University of Oxford
Duration of Study in the UK
3 years, 0 months, 4 days
Research summary
Atherosclerosis is the build-up of lipid (fat) deposits within the walls of large arteries. This condition affects multiple arteries and the larger the fat deposits, the more likely to cause heart attacks or strokes. Identifying patients with large fat deposits in specific locations in the body may help guide the use of new lipid lowering drugs, where currently using these drugs on all patients is not practical, nor advisable.
This is a prospective, non-randomised study that is designed to apply new technologies to categorise patients for future treatments that would benefit them the most. If successful and we can establish that these imaging technologies are effective in direct measurements of fat deposits and inflammatory status, this may lead to the use these imaging techniques in the future and can guide specific treatments for patients with atherosclerosis.
This study applies two different techniques to measure lipid deposits in two different locations - heart (coronary) and neck (carotid) arteries. Heart disease patients scheduled to undergo coronary angiography will undergo a new magnetic resonance imaging technique (called T2 mapping) which can accurately estimate fat deposits in neck (carotid) arteries. This will be combined with an imaging device using harmless infra-red waves to estimate fat deposits within heart (coronary) arteries.
We know that how inflamed fat tissue around arteries is, plays a role in atherosclerosis. It has recently been found that we can assess the degree of inflammation by computer tomography (CT). We will check this CT technique with microscopic analysis of tissue from the arteries of patients scheduled for neck vessel surgery (carotid endarterectomy). In this group we will also apply T2 mapping MRI to study fat distribution within and around neck arteries.
REC name
South Central - Oxford C Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
16/SC/0102
Date of REC Opinion
24 Mar 2016
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion