CI MED-led research partnership advances heart disease screening

Carle Illinois College of Medicine is partnering with Carle Health and the Butkus Foundation to determine which commonly used screening test is more effective at detecting early signs of heart trouble in people without symptoms, especially those with a strong family history of coronary artery disease.

The research study leaders are calling it, “Sub-clinical Coronary Atherosclerosis in Asymptomatic Individuals with Family History of Premature Coronary Artery Disease: A Prospective Community-Based Study.” Key to moving forward with the effort is support from the Take Heart™ Initiative, a national effort inspired by Hall of Fame NFL linebacker Dick Butkus after his 2001 heart scan revealed three 100% blocked arteries and two 95% blocked arteries, despite having no symptoms.

The life-saving quintuple bypass that immediately followed extended his life by 23 years and inspired his decades-long advocacy for early detection and prevention. While a student at the University of Illinois, Butkus played both offense and defense for the Fighting Illini and led the team to a Rose Bowl victory in 1963.

The study will target individuals aged 25 to 55 years without any symptoms, including those with or without a family history of early coronary disease. In the first phase, participants will be screened with coronary calcium scoring, a short CT scan that assesses calcium buildup in the coronary arteries.

“If there is calcium, you know there is plaque in the arteries,” said Dr. Issam Moussa, a CI MED clinical professor and medical director at the Carle Foundation Hospital Heart and Vascular Institute. “If you have zero calcium, the usual thinking is that your arteries are clear.”

Only study participants with zero calcium move on to a second, more detailed 3D scan called a computed CT angiography. This test looks for all types of artery plaque, including non-calcified (early-stage, soft) plaque that may not yet show any calcium.

Moussa said the research team anticipates the study will find that people with a family history of coronary disease are much more likely to have artery plaque not detected by the first test, even when their calcium scores are zero. “Specifically, we estimate about 40 to 50 percent of these individuals may actually have plaque compared to only about 10 percent of people without a family history of heart disease,” he said.

“In this partnership, we are taking a simple, affordable calcium scan and using artificial intelligence to actually get a lot more information out of it,” CI MED Dean Mark Cohen said. “We are integrating family history, comorbidities, and other signals to not only determine the most ideal imaging screening test a patient will need but also to identify risks not easily seen by the human eye or standard screening methods. In this way, we are creating better models and analytics that allow us to get more patients into preventive treatment programs and new clinical trials to save lives."

"Together we will be able to advance the field and improve risk screening for sudden cardiac death, saving more lives around the country and around the world."

CI MED Dean Mark Cohen, MD

If the data from the study confirms the theory, it could lead to changes in how doctors screen for coronary disease in patients whose parents or siblings had early coronary disease.

The Butkus Foundation highlighted the partnership at the annual Butkus Awards event that honors athletic achievement and service to the community. Watch a clip of the ceremony here.

Editor's note: This article was adapted from one originally published by Carle Health. The original can be found here.