At a glance
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New Technologies to Determine Carotid Plaque Vulnerability: A Pilot Study to Assess Contrast-Enhanced Ultrasound (CEUS) and Shear Wave Elastography (SWE) in Patients With Significant Carotid Plaques
In Brief
A Phase 2 clinical trial evaluating Contrast-enhanced ultrasound, Shear Wave Elastography, and 1 other intervention for Carotid Artery Plaque. Completed, enrolled 54 participants across 1 site.
Detailed Summary
The researchers are trying to determine if the characterization of "vulnerable" carotid artery plaques can be accomplished with ultrasound-based methods that look for vessels in the plaque and measure the plaque stiffness.
Study Details
Timeline
Interventions
Subjects will receive a low mechanical index (0.17-0.20) imaging during ultrasound contrast agent intravenous infusion. Real-time cine-loop including longitudinal and transverse images obtained at least 3 seconds before and 5 minutes after the appearance of the contrast effect in the lumen of the carotid artery will be acquired and digitally stored for offline analysis. Also use of a 3D ultrasound transducer to evaluate the feasibility of using US images with contrast to assess the residual diameter of the diseased vessel. Specifically, two 3D acquisitions of each lesion would be obtained after contrast has been injected.
Shear wave elastography will be performed with the General Electric Logiq E9 scanner acquiring images of each plaque in the longitudinal and transverse imaging planes. In each plane 10 measurements will be made and the in-phase/quadrature (IQ) data will be saved for further analysis. The plaque area in the imaging plane will be user-defined to extract the wave velocity values for a ROI analysis.
A standard carotid US examination using Duplex imaging will performed using a linear array transducer to obtain longitudinal and transverse images. All ultrasound measurements will be made by a trained registered vascular technologist. Severity of stenosis of the plaque will be measured based on established protocol and guidelines.