The new era of coronary CT angiography: From anatomy to function / 医学研究生学报

ABSTRACT

Coronary computed tomography (CCTA) has become an important modality in the evaluation of coronary artery disease (CAD). CCTA is able to evaluate beyond the lumen in characterizing and quantifying atherosclerotic plaques, including features of calcification and fat around lesions. Although CCTA has high negative predictive value to exclude obstructive CAD, it has low specificity in the diagnosis of ischemia-inducing lesions. Recent advances in CT technology have resulted in the development of multiple functional CT techniques to provide hemodynamic information, such as coronary transluminal attenuation gradient (TAG), CT-derived fractional flow reserve (CT-FFR), computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and CT perfusion (CTP). In this article, we provide a perspective on these cardiac CT techniques in the evaluation of CAD.