Monday, December 2 | 3:40 p.m.-3:50 p.m. | SSE06-05 | Room E353A
Acquiring coronary CT angiography (CCTA) in addition to head CT for patients suspected of having an acute ischemic stroke can help identify potential sources of cardioembolic stroke while also providing insight into the patients' risk of coronary artery disease, according to this study to be presented on Monday.A research group from Canada examined the clinical data of approximately 1,400 patients confirmed to have ischemic stroke by a standard "hot stroke" imaging protocol that included conventional head CT and CT angiography.
Among these patients, nearly 8% also underwent CCTA, and roughly half of this subcohort turned out to have a cardioembolic stroke. The predominant high-risk source of cardioembolic stroke was having prosthetic cardiac valves, and several of the medium-risk sources included patent foramen ovale and mitral annular calcifications.
The findings indicate that CCTA plus head CT can reliably identify potential sources of clinically suspected cardioembolic strokes and additionally deliver a risk assessment of the coronary arteries, noted Dr. Sadia Qamar and colleagues from Vancouver General Hospital.
"Early and quick identification of the cardioembolic source is of paramount importance in strategizing the appropriate therapeutic options for patients presenting with acute stroke," Qamar told AuntMinnie.com. "The necessity of one-stop-shop imaging for the patients presenting with an acute stroke in the emergency department is adequately provided with multiple-detector-row CT."
![Images show the pectoralis muscles of a healthy male individual who never smoked (age, 66 years; height, 178 cm; body mass index [BMI, calculated as weight in kilograms divided by height in meters squared], 28.4; number of cigarette pack-years, 0; forced expiratory volume in 1 second [FEV1], 97.6% predicted; FEV1: forced vital capacity [FVC] ratio, 0.71; pectoralis muscle area [PMA], 59.4 cm2; pectoralis muscle volume [PMV], 764 cm3) and a male individual with a smoking history and chronic obstructive pulmonary disorder (COPD) (age, 66 years; height, 178 cm; BMI, 27.5; number of cigarette pack-years, 43.2, FEV1, 48% predicted; FEV1:FVC, 0.56; PMA, 35 cm2; PMV, 480.8 cm3) from the Canadian Cohort Obstructive Lung Disease (i.e., CanCOLD) study. The CT image is shown in the axial plane. The PMV is automatically extracted using the developed deep learning model and overlayed onto the lungs for visual clarity.](https://img.auntminnie.com/mindful/smg/workspaces/default/uploads/2026/03/genkin.25LqljVF0y.jpg?auto=format%2Ccompress&crop=focalpoint&dpr=2&fit=crop&h=167&q=70&w=250)
