Jonathan E Feig
Zena and Michael A Wiener Cardiovascular Institute, Mount Sinai Heart, Mount Sinai Hospital, Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, One Gustave L. Levy Place, New York-10029,
Tanzania
Commentary
The Regression of Atherosclerosis: The Power of Multimodality Imaging
Author(s): Jonathan E Feig, Jessica L Feig and Annapoorna S KiniJonathan E Feig, Jessica L Feig and Annapoorna S Kini
Coronary artery disease remains a leading cause of death in the Western world. It is well known that the reduction of cholesterol levels by statin therapy is associated with significant decreases in plaque burden. However, a critical question has been the ability of statin therapy to lead to lipid egress from plaque and subsequent plaque stabilization. This is crucial since lipid-rich coronary plaques are at increased risk for rupture and thrombus leading to events. We recently addressed this issue by conducting the YELLOW (reduction in yellow plaque by aggressive lipid-lowering therapy) trial. We reported that short-term intensive statin therapy reduces lipid content as assessed by near infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) in obstructive lesions. Histopathological studies suggest that the majority of acute coronary events are related to occlusive thrombus formation after disruption of a thin.. View More»