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J Am Coll Cardiol, 2006; 47:565-572, doi:10.1016/j.jacc.2005.09.036
(Published online 13 January 2006). © 2006 by the American College of Cardiology Foundation |
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* Division of Epidemiology, School of Public Health, School of Medicine, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota
Department of Radiology, School of Medicine, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, Minnesota
Advanced Imaging Research Center, Oregon Health & Science University, Portland, Oregon
Department of Nutrition, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway
Manuscript received May 20, 2005; revised manuscript received September 5, 2005, accepted September 19, 2005.
* Reprint requests and correspondence: Dr. Michael Jerosch-Herold, Advanced Imaging Research Center, MS L452, 3181 SW Sam Jackson Park Road, Portland, Oregon 97239 (Email: jeroschh{at}ohsu.edu).
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Abstract |
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BACKGROUND: Clinical studies suggest that myocardial perfusion is often abnormal in individuals without CHD but with risk factors. Epidemiologic study in asymptomatic populations is lacking.
METHODS: Two hundred twenty-two men and women, ages 45 to 84 years and free of a CHD diagnosis, in the University of Minnesota field center of the Multi-Ethnic Study of Atherosclerosis (MESA) had myocardial blood flow (MBF) determined using cardiac magnetic resonance imaging at rest and during adenosine-induced hyperemia. Perfusion reserve (PR) was calculated as the ratio of hyperemic to rest MBF.
RESULTS: Both resting and hyperemic MBF were lower in men than in women, even after considering age and menopause. Hyperemic MBF was also significantly lower in subjects who were older, and in those with higher blood pressure, higher fasting glucose, and lower low-density lipoprotein cholesterol. After adjusting for age, gender, and race, reduced PR was independently associated with hypertension, higher diastolic blood pressure, and higher total and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol, but was not associated with cigarette smoking, obesity, physical activity, or diabetes. Moreover, hyperemic MBF and PR were correlated strongly and inversely with estimated 10-year CHD risk based on Framingham equations (p for trends: <0.0001).
CONCLUSIONS: Coronary vasoreactivity is reduced in asymptomatic individuals with a greater coronary risk factor burden. Our study results imply that changes in coronary vascular reactivity, in response to risk factors, may be detected in adults without symptomatic CHD.
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The objective of this study was to determine the cross-sectional relation between myocardial perfusion, studied with a validated cardiac magnetic resonance imaging (CMR) technique at rest and during adenosine-induced hyperemia, and CHD risk factors in asymptomatic individuals. We hypothesized that perfusion reserve (PR), calculated as the ratio of hyperemic MBF to resting MBF, is inversely associated with levels of CHD risk factors.
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MR image acquisition. Participants were asked to abstain from caffeine intake for 12 h before their CMR exam. Cardiac magnetic resonance imaging was performed with a 1.5-T clinical magnetic resonance scanner (Sonata, Siemens Medical Systems, Iselin, New Jersey) at the Fairview-University of Minnesota hospital. The participant was positioned supine with an intravenous (IV) needle inserted into an antecubital vein for injection of MR contrast and infusion of adenosine. A flexible, four-element phased array coil was placed on the participant’s chest at the level of the heart; two elements of a spine array coil integrated into the patient table were used as posterior coil elements. Scout magnetic resonance images were acquired first, to determine the orientation of the long and short axis of the left ventricle. Blood pressure, heart rate, and the electrocardiogram were monitored and recorded during the CMR examination. Rate-pressure product (RPP), at rest and hyperemia, was calculated as the product of heart rate (in beats/min) multiplied by systolic blood pressure (in mm Hg) during the scan and divided by 10,000.
We conducted T1-weighted imaging with a fast gradient echo sequence for two to three slices in a short-axis orientation (slice thickness: 8 mm) to track the first pass of an injected contrast agent bolus through the right and left ventricle and its recirculation. A Gd-DTPA bolus (Magnevist, Berlex, Wayne, New Jersey) of 0.04 mmol per kg of body weight (total volume mean ± SD: 6.5 ± 1.2 ml) was injected, starting at the third or fourth heartbeat, with a power injector at a rate of 7 ml/s, followed by a saline flush of 10 ml at the same injection rate. All slices were imaged during each heartbeat, for a total of 50 heart beats. The number of slices was adjusted to two or three to meet the overriding priority of achieving a temporal resolution equivalent to each participant’s R-to-R duration. A first perfusion scan was performed during rest, followed by a second scan about 15 min later during maximal vasodilation. Vasodilation was induced by intravenous infusion of adenosine: 0.14 mg/kg/min for 3 min before start of the scan, blocked for approximately 3 s during MR contrast injection, and resumed immediately thereafter. The adenosine infusion was not completely turned off until acquisition of the first 10 to 15 images. Brief, asymptomatic atrial-ventricular (AV) blocks (duration <5 s) were observed in 43 cases, all of which occurred after the contrast bolus injection, and adenosine had already been infused for an initial 3 min. The AV blocks resolved within a few seconds after the adenosine infusion was stopped. The perfusion scans were completed, and hyperemic MBF was determined in all cases where adenosine infusion was prematurely terminated. All MBF measurements were used in statistical analyses. Repeated analyses eliminating those participants who had a brief AV block yielded relatively weaker results.
Image analysis and MBF quantification. Endocardial and epicardial contours were manually traced. The myocardium was subdivided into eight transmural sectors of equal circumferential extent along the myocardial centerline. Region-of-interest signal intensity (SI) curves were generated with the MASS CMR image analysis software (Laboratory for Clinical and Experimental Image Processing, Leiden University, Leiden, the Netherlands). Signal intensity curves represent the change of mean SI in each myocardial sector as a function of time. The mean SI before appearance of the contrast agent in the left ventricle was subtracted for baseline correction of each signal curve. In accordance with the central volume principle (15), MBF was estimated from the initial amplitude of the myocardial impulse response by deconvolution analysis of the myocardial SI curves. To perform a model-independent deconvolution of the SI curves, custom-written software was used with an arterial input measured in the center of the left ventricle (16,17). Perfusion reserve was calculated as the ratio of MBF during hyperemia to rest. Since no focal perfusion defect was observed in any participant, all measurements reported in the present study are global averages over the eight myocardial segments and two to three slices.
Measurement of risk factors.
Risk factors were measured at the MESA clinic using standardized methods. "Ever smoking" was defined as lifetime consumption of more than 100 cigarettes. "Current smoking" was defined as smoking cigarettes within the past 30 days. "Former smoking" was defined as ever but not current smoking. Level of physical activity was computed by multiplying total time of activity per week by activity intensity values. Height and weight were measured, and body mass index (BMI, kg/m2) was assessed. Resting seated blood pressure was measured three times using an automated oscillometric sphygmomanometer, and the average of the last two measurements was used for analysis (called "clinic blood pressure"). Hypertension was defined as systolic blood pressure 
140 mm Hg, diastolic blood pressure 90 mm Hg, self-reported history of hypertension, or current use of antihypertensive medications. Blood samples were obtained from participants after 8 h of fasting and analyzed at a central laboratory for glucose, total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol, and high-density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol. Diabetes mellitus was defined as fasting glucose 126 mg/dl, self-reported history of diabetes, or taking diabetes medications.
Statistical analysis. Participants were excluded from statistical analysis if they had missing values on any one of the major perfusion measurements (resting MBF, hyperemic MBF or PR, n = 5), or they took caffeine within 12 h before CMR scanning (n = 7). Analysis was performed using SAS software (SAS Institute, Cary, North Carolina), version 8. The perfusion and hemodynamic measurements were compared across categories of risk factors using t tests or analysis of variance (ANOVA). Pearson correlation coefficients were calculated between continuous risk factors and perfusion measurements. Linear regression analysis was performed to estimate the difference in MBF and PR predicted by a given difference in risk factor, including, if needed, a quadratic term for continuous variables to test the curvilinear trend. Because of potential concerns with the statistical properties of PR measured as a ratio (18,19), we also modeled absolute hyperemic MBF with adjustment for resting MBF as an alternative presentation of PR. Each risk factor was first modeled separately, adjusting only for demographic factors such as age, gender, and race. Afterwards, all the major risk factors, including cigarette smoking habit, BMI, physical activity, hypertension, diabetes, and blood lipids, were entered simultaneously. Finally, to evaluate the joint effect of risk factors on perfusion, 10-year risk of CHD was estimated using the Framingham risk scoring method (20). Perfusion measures were compared across categories of absolute and relative CHD risk using ANOVA. A value of p < 0.05 (two-sided) was considered to indicate statistical significance.
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Perfusion reserve ranged from 1.18 to 5.24 (mean ± SD: 3.05 ± 0.84). Perfusion reserve was significantly lower among male participants, those at older ages, and those with hypertension and higher levels of fasting glucose, total cholesterol, and LDL cholesterol (Table 1). Age demonstrated the strongest and most significant correlation with PR (r = – 0.36, p < 0.0001), followed by clinic systolic blood pressure (r = –0.24, p = 0.0003), diastolic blood pressure (r = –0.21, p = 0.002), fasting glucose (r = –0.16, p = 0.02), total cholesterol (r = –0.14, p = 0.04), and LDL cholesterol (r = –0.12, p = 0.07). Other risk factors did not show significant correlations with PR. After adjusting for age, gender, and race, participants who had one unit higher diastolic blood pressure, total cholesterol, and LDL cholesterol had lower hyperemic MBF by 0.0099, 0.0028, and 0.0025 ml/g/min, respectively, and lower PR by 0.013, 0.0044, and 0.0039, respectively (Table 2). Subjects with prevalent hypertension had 0.30 lower PR than did those without hypertension. In the multivariate adjusted model, the inverse relation of PR with hypertension and blood cholesterol remained statistically significant even after adjusting for all the other traditional risk factors simultaneously (Table 3). Stratified analysis revealed that the associations were relatively stronger in the middle-aged participants (45 to 64 years) compared to older participants (65 years), but did not differ by gender or medication use.
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Myocardial perfusion imaging examination was originally designed to assess the hemodynamic response of obstructive epicardial stenosis. Further research found that impairment of coronary vasoreactivity may appear even before the development of obstructive lesions and therefore might serve as an early marker of subclinical atherosclerosis. Previous non-invasive investigations of MBF in relation to CHD risk factors have been mostly conducted in clinical case-control studies. In agreement with prior work by others (21–25), we observed that resting MBF increases with age whereas hyperemic MBF and PR decline with age; MBF is higher in women than in men, both at rest and during hyperemia, even after correction for RPP and adjustment for age. The significantly higher MBF and PR found in our female participants without obstructive CHD remained even when menopause status and hormone use were considered, which suggests that the gender difference may not be completely explained by a direct effect of estrogen. We also corroborated other studies (26–28) showing that PR induced by endothelium-independent vasodilators was similar in smokers and non-smokers. Myocardial blood flow abnormalities were seen in our asymptomatic subjects with hypertension, which was consistent with earlier findings of perfusion defects in hypertensive patients with no significant CHD (1,2). Besides the increased resting MBF due to the higher myocardial oxygen consumption (29), hypertension also increases total coronary vascular resistance (30), which further reduces PR. Reductions in stress MBF and PR have been previously reported in both type 1 (3–5) and type 2 (4,6,7) diabetes patients in the absence of clinical CHD, attributable to hyperglycemia, hyperinsulinemia and insulin resistance, or a pronounced accumulation of other risk factors. In our study, hyperemic MBF and PR were relatively lower in diabetic than in non-diabetic participants, and fasting blood glucose was inversely correlated with PR. However, these associations disappeared when adjusting for other risk factors. One of the more persistent associations we found is for hypercholesterolemia. Compared with normocholesterolemic subjects, in subjects with high levels of total cholesterol or LDL cholesterol, elevated resting MBF combined with decreased hyperemic MBF resulted in a significantly lower PR. Diminished maximal MBF and PR have been seen in patients with familial hypercholesterolemia but without overt atherosclerosis (8–10). Non-significant atherosclerotic lesions caused by hypercholesterolemia may increase vessel wall stiffness and weaken the smooth muscle layer (31). Hypercholesterolemia also causes endothelial dysfunction in large conduit vessels, as well as in resistance vessels (32). High HDL cholesterol did not seem to ameliorate unfavorable PR.
Compared to previous clinical studies of highly selected patients, the associations of myocardial perfusion with individual risk factors in our study were generally weak. This is not surprising, considering that our study subjects were from a population with, on average, moderate risk factor levels. When the overall risk burden was assessed using the Framingham prediction equations, risk factor burden was strongly and inversely associated with hyperemic MBF and PR. Moreover, in the current study, the inverse correlations of hyperemic MBF and PR with systolic blood pressure and fasting glucose level were substantially attenuated and no longer statistically significant after age adjustment. Such strong confounding by age was not seen in most other studies, probably because those studies usually focused on the association between MBF and single risk factors, such as smoking, hyperlipidemia, and diabetes mellitus, and compared patients with age- and gender-matched control groups. Our study population had a broad age range, and age demonstrated the strongest risk factor correlation with PR; therefore, the remaining effect of other individual risk factors, independent of age, was relatively small. Finally, few studies have addressed MBF in association with obesity and physical activity. In our study, greater physical activity or smaller BMI did not relate to higher age-adjusted hyperemic MBF and PR.
Perfusion reserve, calculated as the ratio of hyperemic MBF divided by resting MBF, could be reduced by either a decrease in the numerator or an elevation in the denominator, or both. In the scenario of CHD, when the coronary resistance vessels get sparser, smaller, or less responsive to vasodilatory stimuli, the maximal MBF will be abnormally low while resting MBF may remain normal (18). High resting flow is most likely caused by conditions requiring increased cardiac work and consequently higher myocardial demand for energy, when compensatory mechanisms, e.g., dilation of the distal vascular bed, become involved even at rest. In such cases, the remaining available flow reserve might decrease even if the maximal flow attainable does not diminish. For most risk factors investigated in the present study, the inverse relation with PR resulted primarily from an inverse relation with hyperemic MBF, combined with a trend toward a positive relation with resting MBF. Modeling PR alternatively as hyperemic MBF with adjustment for resting MBF yielded similar results (Table 2).
The CMR first-pass technique combined with the model-independent deconvolution method used in our study to quantify MBF was previously validated in experimental animal studies by comparison to MBF measurements with radio-isotope labeled microspheres (16), which is regarded as the reference method for quantification of MBF, although it is not applicable to human studies. The linear correlation of CMR-estimated MBF against measurements from radio-isotope labeled microspheres was excellent (r2 = 0.995, slope: 0.96, intercept: 0.06). The reliability of MBF quantification in the current study was generally satisfactory. The coefficient of variation of repeated measurements in each myocardial sector, performed one year apart, averaged 16.7 ± 14.4% (n = 13 subjects) for resting MBF and 16.6 ± 13.3% (n = 8 subjects) for hyperemic MBF.
The blood flow response to adenosine is predominantly elicited by relaxation of coronary arteriolar smooth muscle cells. An endothelium-mediated dilation of the proximal vessels, induced by the increased blood flow, could further enhance the total vasodilatory response. Considering atherogenesis to have multiple stages offers another explanation for the dose-response relation we observed between risk factor levels and PR. In some individuals with just mild to moderate CHD risk factor elevations, selective dysfunction of endothelium alone may or may not produce an abnormal vasodilation to adenosine. Among subjects with a more advanced risk profile, a more extensive disorder of endothelial cells and smooth muscle cells may further impair PR.
Several issues should be considered as potential limitations of the current study. First of all, in this cross-sectional study, we can only assess the correlation of risk factor levels with concurrent PR. The causal effect of a risk factor on the development of vasoreactivity impairment cannot be established. In addition, the prognostic value of risk factor assessment versus a measurement of myocardial perfusion cannot be compared at this point because of the lack of follow-up data. Secondly, because these asymptomatic participants did not undergo coronary angiography, some may have had obstructive atherosclerotic lesions that were not detected clinically. Coronary calcification was measured by computed tomography in this cohort, but the coronary calcium burden cannot reliably predict stenosis severity or the hemodynamic significance of a calcified lesion. For these reasons, it is difficult to infer a direct effect of CHD risk factors on vascular function, independent of coronary stenosis burden. Thirdly, the majority of subjects in this asymptomatic population had a low to medium predicted 10-year CHD risk. Few participants had extraordinarily adverse risk characteristics. Although our sample size was moderate, we may not have had sufficient statistical power to detect some weak but real associations. One also may not be able to directly generalize our findings from the subgroup of MESA volunteers who participated in the perfusion study, to the whole MESA population due to differences in BMI and the prevalence of hypertension. Finally, we cannot rule out the possibility that the hyperemic MBF response was attenuated by premature stopping of adenosine in participants having an AV block, although this concern was not borne out by a comparison of MBF measured in subjects with versus those without AV block. The high proportion of patients with AV block is probably secondary to use of the same IV line for adenosine and MR contrast. Use of two IV lines could have avoided this complication. Previous studies report that, during intracoronary administration of adenosine in patients, a plateau phase, when the coronary flow velocity remains within 10% of its peak value, lasts approximately 6 s after stopping the adenosine infusion (33,34). Therefore, we expect that when IV adenosine is not resumed after the 3-min initial infusion because of a transient AV block, MBF will stay close to its peak for the initial myocardial contrast-enhancement, which is sufficiently long to estimate hyperemic MBF (35).
In conclusion, our study shows that coronary vasoreactivity is reduced in asymptomatic adults with a greater coronary risk factor burden. With respect to individual risk factors, age is correlated inversely with the vasodilatory response. High diastolic blood pressure, total cholesterol, and LDL cholesterol are associated with lower flow response independent of age. These findings corroborate that functional changes in coronary vasculature may occur in asymptomatic adults with risk factors, which supports reduced vasoreactivity as an indicator of CHD before its clinical manifestation. Our investigations improve the understanding of the physiology and pathophysiology role of myocardial perfusion in the process of coronary atherosclerosis. Findings from this study also provide important baseline information for future research on the clinical use of perfusion studies, as well as on the subclinical CHD evaluation.
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