Workshop on Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) held at Max Hospital today

NewZNew (Chandigarh) : A health work shop on Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) was held at Max Super Speciality Hospital (MSSH), Mohali today which was attended by over 20 Cardiologists from the region. Speaking during occasion, Dr Sudheer Saxena, Director & Head Cardiology, MSSH said that there were many advantages of using OCT over intravascular imaging (IVUS) which was conventionally used to evaluate angioplasty patients.

Both OCT and IVUS were used to make measurements for lesion length and lumen size, but OCT has emerged as more accurate and was advantageous to interventional cardiologists thanks to its high-resolution imaging technique that offered microscopic visualization of coronary plaques, he asserted.

Talking about the advantages of OCT over IVUS, Dr Saxena informed that OCT offered clear, photographic quality images, as opposed to grainy, lower-resolution IVUS images. Many interventionists were confounded by the speckled IVUS images, which were sometimes difficult to interpret. Fine details, such as stent position and thrombus, could be difficult to detect through IVUS. Whereas OCT would give a clear picture on whether stent deployed in heart was endothelialized or not . This helped physicians to adjust the dose of anti platelet drugs the blood thinners. OCT also allowed to identify three types of coronary plaques such as fibrous, fibrocalcific, and lipid, pointed out Dr Saxena.

Moreover OCT and IVUS technologies were analogous in nature. Where OCT would use light and IVUS use sound waves into the vessel wall where the energy was sent back to the catheter to reconstruct an image. The wavelength of light was much shorter and much faster than to sound waves. For this reason, OCT has a resolution of 10 microns which was 10 times greater than of IVUS, maintained Dr Saxena.

[blockquote author=”Dr Saxena.” pull=”pullright”]Interestingly in OCT images the Interventionists could easily see thrombus the blood clots in arteries of heart which could lead to blocking of heart vessels and thin-cap atheroma which give rise to heart attacks[/blockquote]

Some important facts on heart disease:

·        Heart diseases strikes those who are unaware, 60 % of attacks occur in people who never had any symptom before.

·        Almost 50 % of Heart attack are fatal in the very First hour.

·        In western countries the death rate has fallen in heart patients, but in countries like India there has been a phenomenal jump.

·        India is soon going to be the diabetic, hypertensive and Heart disease capital of the world with the maximum number of patients.

·        Heart disease is the leading cause of death for both men and women globally.

·        In 2010 the cost of managing Heat disease alone in USA was $ 108.9 billion.

·        38% of women die within a year after having a heart attack, as compared to 25% of men

·        One can add up to 5 years to one’s life expectancy by quitting smoking.