Active clinical trials for "Coronary Artery Disease"

1.1 To build a TCM diagnosis and treatment database for chronic stable CAD; 1.2 To summarize the pattern of TCM medicine used and the effect of the medication in chronic stable CAD. 1.3 To formulate a syndrome differentiation determined medicine plan based on the improvement in the quality of life on chronic stable CAD patients.

Background: Stress echocardiography (SE) has an established role in evidence-based guidelines, but recently the breadth and variety of applications has extended well beyond coronary artery disease (CAD). Purpose: To establish a prospective research study of SE applications, in and beyond CAD, also considering a variety of signs in addition to regional wall motion abnormalities. Methods: In a prospective, multicenter, international, observational study design, > 100 certified high-volume SE labs will be networked with an organized system of clinical, laboratory and imaging data collection at the time of physical or pharmacological SE, with structured follow-up information. The study is endorsed by the Italian Society of Echocardiography and organized in 10 subprojects focusing on: contractile reserve for prediction of cardiac resynchronization or medical therapy response; stress B-lines in heart failure; hypertrophic cardiomyopathy; heart failure with preserved ejection fraction; mitral regurgitation after either transcatheter or surgical aortic valve replacement; outdoor SE in extreme physiology; right ventricular contractile reserve in repaired tetralogy of Fallot; suspected or initial pulmonary arterial hypertension; coronary flow velocity, left ventricular elastance reserve and B-lines in known or suspected CAD; identification of subclinical familial disease in phenotype-negative healthy relatives of inherited disease (such as hypertrophic cardiomyopathy). Expected Results:To collect about 10,000 patients over a 5-year period (2016-2020), with sample sizes ranging from 5,000 for known or suspected CAD to around 250 for hypertrophic cardiomyopathy or repaired Fallot. This data base will allow to investigate technical questions such as feasibility and reproducibility of various SE parameters and to assess their prognostic value in different clinical scenarios. Conclusions: The study will create the cultural, informatic and scientific infrastructure connecting high-volume, accredited SE labs, to obtain original safety, feasibility, and outcome data in evidence-poor diagnostic fields, also outside the established core application of SE in CAD based on regional wall motion abnormalities. The study will standardize procedures, validate emerging signs, and integrate the new information with established knowledge, helping to build a next-generation SE lab without inner walls.

"Cardiovascular Imaging and Biomarker Analyses (CIBER)" is a single-center, prospective and observational study evaluating the expression of novel biomarkers in patients undergoing cardiacvascular imaging within clinical routine care. It is aimed to evaluate associations with biomarker expressions with ascertained cardiac imaging parameters.

About 13 million people in the United States have coronary artery disease (CAD). It is the leading cause of death in both men and women. Coronary artery disease (CAD) occurs when the blood vessels that supply blood to the heart muscle (the coronary arteries) become hardened and narrowed. The arteries harden and narrow due to buildup of fatty and calcified material called plaque on their inner walls. The buildup of plaque is also called atherosclerosis. This is a process which starts early in life, but can be influenced by multiple factors. Several factors increase the risk of developing atherosclerosis. They include high blood pressure, smoking, diabetes, high cholesterol and being related to someone who had a heart attack or a stroke. The more risk factors you have, the greater the chance that you have severe atherosclerosis. Some of the risk factors cannot be modified, like age and family history of early heart disease. The influenceable factors include high blood pressure, high blood cholesterol, high blood sugar, cigarette smoking, overweight or obesity, and lack of physical activity. Nevertheless, there are patients without any above mentioned risk factors who develop atherosclerosis. In addition to that, there are also patients with several risk factors who do not develop severe coronary artery disease. According to research studies high blood levels of some substances in the blood (biochemical markers) as well as some genes in the DNA of our cells may be associated with an increased risk of developing CAD and faster progression of the disease. The purpose of this study is to find a correlation between certain blood markers and growth of the plaques, regardless of the presence of the classic risk factors for atherosclerosis. If we prove our hypothesis we will be one step closer to predicting the extent of atherosclerosis by performing certain blood tests.

To evaluate the clinical values of using dose reduction techniques in 64-row multi-slice CT coronary artery imaging.

Mechanisms that link metabolic syndrome to atherosclerosis are incompletely understood. As a part of Hämeenlinna Metabolic Syndrome Research Program (HMS) surrogate indicators for atherosclerosis are studied in 120 men with metabolic syndrome, 120 men with coronary heart disease and 80 physically active controls and in different settings.

Optical coherence tomography (OCT) has been recently studied for evaluation of coronary stenting. Because of high resolutions, several reports have shown that OCT is appropriate for evaluating neointimal tissue after coronary stent implantation. Also, the strut coverage and the characterization of neointimal tissue can be accurately evaluated. Furthermore, OCT-defined coverage of a stent strut was proposed to be related with clinical safety in drug-eluting stents-treated patients. Therefore, the investigators will evaluate the appropriateness of currently using coronary stents (e.g. Sirolimus eluting stent, Paclitaxel-eluting stent, Zotarolimus-eluting stent, Everolimus-eluting stent, Biolimus eluting stent, EPC(endothelial progenitor cell) Capture stent, etc) based on the findings of OCT. Additionally, the investigators will evaluate neointimal hyperplasia, malposition or strut coverage to decide the differences in the stent characteristics, the duration of antiplatelet use, and the differences according to the clinical presentations.

Primary Objectives: To characterize cardiometabolic risk factor profiles of patients entering cardiac rehab using traditional approaches (eg LDL-C) as well as a more comprehensive panel of cardiovascular and metabolic biomarkers. It is hypothesized that the comprehensive panel will identify further increased risk that would not have been detected using only traditional approaches. Specifically, it is hypothesized that a greater percentage of the cohort will be identified with "high risk" levels of LDL-P (>1100 nmol/L) and/or apoB (>80 mg/dL) than of LDL-C (>100 mg/dL). It is further hypothesized that the prevalence of elevated Lp(a) and elevated levels of inflammatory and insulin resistance markers will be higher in this cohort when compared to population norms (HDL, inc reference data). To assess improvements in laboratory and lifestyle risk factors and rate of goal attainment at completion of rehab (eg 3 months). This objective is primarily descriptive, and improvements in traditional risk factors (eg LDL-C) will be compared to existing published data. Improvements in non-traditional risk factors (eg LDL-P, insulin resistance markers) in a cardiac rehab population have not been extensively investigated. To determine which attributes at baseline best predicted recurrent events and re-hospitalizations assessed one year later. Secondary/Developmental Objective: To inform and guide development of a subsequent study protocol designed to compare outcomes associated with biomarker-guided personalized treatment plans vs. standard of care in the cardiac rehab setting.

Coronary artery calcification (CAC) is a pandemic condition in elderly patients with coronary artery disease (CAD) and associated with worse prognosis. Although available data shows association between testosterone levels in men and CAD, the association between testosterone and CAC in old-aged male patients with CAD remains unknown. In this study, the relationship of serum testosterone levels with CAC score in elderly male patients with CAD was evaluated.

The design and purpose of the current study is to expand and validate previous findings that the IL-1 gene cluster composite genotype patterns potentiate the risk for coronary artery disease (CAD) and cardiovascular events mediated by OxPL and Lp(a). A secondary objective is to validate other, non IL-1 genetic variants associated with CAD.