The Coronary Calcium Scores Heart Test: How Useful Is It? – Part I

Calcium is a constituent of plaque that could gradually accrue in the interiors of the coronary arteries which deliver oxygen-inundated blood to the heart muscle. By gauging it, the extent of plaque accumulation can be determined that leads to constriction of the heart arteries, a characteristic of CAD or coronary arterial disease.

During the course of the test, one is required to lie down flat facing up in a hollow CT scan. The X-ray shafts produce a myriad of images of the heart. Concurrently, a computer computes the quantity and density of the calcium deposits that line the insides of the artery walls and produces calcium score as output. The range of the score could lie between zero to more than four hundred. A score greater than hundred is related to an elevated risk of heart disease.

Research has continually revealed that calcium scores are directly proportional to the risk of heart attack or other CAD episode. In one of the latest studies carried out that was printed in the New England Journal of Medicine illustrated that the coronary calcium score forecasted heart episodes – heart attacks, mortality due CAD, or angina or pain in the chest – amongst both the sexes irrespective of all races. During that study, individuals with coronary calcium score lying between 101 and 300 were more than 7 times as prone to experiencing a heart event as compared to someone with no indication of coronary calcium. Persons with elevated scores were believed to be at higher risk.

On the basis of the conventional risk factors, those persons at transitional risk of heart ailment must go in for this heart test. This would be inclusive of men past the age of 50 having a minimum of one additional risk aspect and women past the age of sixty having two or more risk aspects like high cholesterol and blood pressure. In such persons, the requisite to start medicines in order to curb such risk factors might be unclear.

Individuals with intermediate risk factor having an elevated calcium score might probably necessitate the need for more hard-line lifestyle alterations like aspirin therapy, and additionally an elevated dosage of statin drugs to get the cholesterol under control.

Conversely, those in the high risk bracket due to diabetes or heart or vascular disease must already get started on the aggressive line of treatment. In such cases, evaluating the calcium score would not modify anything.

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