Background

Myocardial CT perfusion (CTP) is a promising tool for the detection of myocardial ischemia. We hypothesize that regadenoson CTP is noninferior to regadenoson single photon emission CT (SPECT) for detecting or excluding myocardial ischemia.

Methods

Patients (men ≥ 45 years; women ≥ 50 years) with known or suspected coronary artery disease (n = 124) were randomized to 1 of 2 diagnostic sequences: rest and regadenoson SPECT on day 1, then regadenoson CTP and rest CTP (and coronary CT angiography [CTA]) (CTA; same acquisition) on day 2 or regadenoson CTP and rest CTP (and CTA) on Day 1, then rest and regadenoson SPECT on day 2. Scanning platforms included 64-, 128-, 256-, and 320-slice systems. The primary analysis examined the agreement rate between CTP and SPECT for detecting or excluding reversible ischemia in ≥ 2 myocardial segments as assessed by independent, blinded readers.

Results

Complete and interpretable CTP and SPECT scans were obtained for 110 patients. Regadenoson CTP was noninferior to SPECT for detecting or excluding reversible ischemia with an agreement rate of 0.87 (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.77-0.97) and sensitivity and specificity of 0.90 (95% CI, 0.71-1.00) and 0.84 (95% CI, 0.77-0.91), respectively. The agreement rate for detecting or excluding ≥ 1 fixed defects by regadenoson CTP and SPECT was 0.86 (95% CI, 0.74-0.98). With SPECT as the reference standard, the diagnostic accuracies for detecting or excluding ischemia by regadenoson CTP and CTA alone were 0.85 (95% CI, 0.78-0.91) and 0.69 (95% CI, 0.60-0.77), respectively.

Conclusions

This study establishes the noninferiority of regadenoson CTP to SPECT for detecting or excluding myocardial ischemia.