Non-invasive CT-derived fractional flow reserve and static rest and stress CT myocardial perfusion imaging for detection of haemodynamically significant coronary stenosis

Computed tomography derived fractional flow reserve (FFR_CT) and computed tomography stress myocardial perfusion imaging (CTP) are techniques to assess haemodynamic significance of coronary stenosis. To compare the diagnostic performance of FFR_CT and static rest/stress CTP in detecting fractional flow reserve (FFR) defined haemodynamically-significant stenosis (FFR ≤ 0.8). Fifty-one patients (96 vessels) with suspected coronary artery disease from a single institution planned for elective invasive-angiography prospectively underwent research indicated 320-detector-CT-coronary-angiography (CTA) and adenosine-stress CTP and invasive FFR. Analyses were performed in separate core-laboratories for FFR_CT and CTP blinded to FFR results. Myocardial perfusion was assessed visually and semi-quantitatively by transmural perfusion ratio (TPR). Invasive FFR ≤ 0.8 was present in 33% of vessels and 49% of patients. FFR_CT, visual CTP and TPR analysis was feasible in 96%, 92% and 92% of patients respectively. Overall per-vessel sensitivity, specificity and diagnostic accuracy for FFR_CT were 81%, 85%, 84%, for visual CTP were 50%, 89%, 75% and for TPR were 69%, 48%, 56% respectively. Receiver-operating-characteristics curve analysis demonstrated larger per vessel area-under-curve (AUC) for FFR_CT (0.89) compared with visual CTP (0.70; p < 0.001), TPR (0.58; p < 0.001) and CTA (0.70; p = 0.0007); AUC for CTA + FFR_CT (0.91) was higher than CTA + visual CTP (0.77, p = 0.008) and CTA + TPR (0.74, p < 0.001). Per-patient AUC for FFR_CT (0.90) was higher than visual CTP (0.69; p = 0.0016), TPR (0.56; p < 0.0001) and CTA (0.68; p = 0.001). Based on this selected cohort of patients FFR_CT is superior to visually and semi-quantitatively assessed static rest/stress CTP in detecting haemodynamically-significant coronary stenosis as determined on invasive FFR.