EBT Calcium Scan

[Kathleen1]

Alas, coronary calcium score greater than 600. Guess I am going on a statin, up the activity and drop the body weight (current BMI of 25). sigh. genes do tell.

[Stavia]

Kathleen, sorry to hear this. In my country we add a small dose of aspirin with a coronary calcium score of over 100, to reduce tbe risk of the microscopic endothelial tears, that inevitably happen with turbulent blood flow due to an an irregular lumen, from progressing to a clot which is always the actual event that causes a heart attack.
Simply -> calcium is a marker of atherosclerosis -> atherosclerosis causes irregularities in the lining of the coronary arteries -> turbulent blood flow -> little tears in lining which is called endothelium -> plaque under lining can cause blood to clot locally -> clot blocks the artery which is a heart attack.
aspirin reduces the clot risk.

statin plus aspirin give a 50% risk reduction together.

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[KatieS]

Kathleen, I'm another 3/4 64 y/o on pravastatin & aspirin for years. Consider home B/P and glucose monitoring, as only the latter went up prior to my husband's heart attack. Now that you know the results you can take steps to control the risks of a number becoming life threatening.

[Kathleen1]

Thanks, I am going to resume the 81mg aspirin (cardiologist had suggested stopping it before I got the scan because apart from family history and elevated cholesterol on the bad side, the good side included no symptoms, good EKG, good BP, glucose, HgA1c (I got a lot of labs for that MEND study protocol) as well as start the statin. I have been following the statin threads here with interest and was leaning toward avoiding it, but not with these numbers. As always, it is encouraging to be in community. Thanks again.

[Julie G]

(((Kathleen)))

[Nancy]

I'm sorry Kathleen. That must be scary to learn, but thankfully, you know now what steps to take to reduce your risk of an event. Also, from what I understand, you can reverse the plaque buildup with diet and exercise, too. The protocols recommended on this forum should help a lot. Godspeed and hugs.

[Tincup]

Kathleen, from the Raggi paper, the idea is to hold any increase in calcium volume to less than 15%/year. The risk is from soft plaque, which is not seen by the scanner. A small increase in calcium score is thought to be from calcification of soft plaque, which stabilizes it. Hard stable plaque, which is what is imaged is not the risk, as I understand it. However large increases of calcium volume are indicative of lots of soft plaque.

[Stavia]

Kathleen, from the Raggi paper, the idea is to hold any increase in calcium volume to less than 15%/year. The risk is from soft plaque, which is not seen by the scanner. A small increase in calcium score is thought to be from calcification of soft plaque, which stabilizes it. Hard stable plaque, which is what is imaged is not the risk, as I understand it. However large increases of calcium volume are indicative of lots of soft plaque.

George, once on a statin this might not be applicable. Statins might cause existing soft plaque to calcify, thus rendering it visible and looking like progression but it is actually stabilision of the plaque and decreased risk. I can't remember the paper exactly - its on our site somewhere. Increased calcium on a statin might not be able to be interpreted in terms of risk.


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[Stavia]

http://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/842499

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[Tincup]

George, once on a statin this might not be applicable. Statins might cause existing soft plaque to calcify, thus rendering it visible and looking like progression but it is actually stabilision of the plaque and decreased risk. I can't remember the paper exactly - its on our site somewhere. Increased calcium on a statin might not be able to be interpreted in terms of risk.

Everybody in Raggi got a statin, too, after the initial scan: "Because of the presence of CAC, all 495 patients were treated with a statin after the initial EBT screening test and were kept on this treatment in the interval between a minimum of 2 consecutive EBT scans." full paper