Journal of Ultrasound in Medicine, Vol 20, Issue 2 113-121, Copyright © 2001 by American Institute of Ultrasound in Medicine
Types of neurovascular symptoms and carotid plaque ultrasonic textural characteristics
T. J. Tegos, D. Mavrophoros, M. M. Sabetai, T. S. Elatrozy, S. Dhanjil, M. Karapataki, N. Witt and A. N. Nicolaides
Department of Vascular Surgery, St Mary's Hospital, Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine, London, United Kingdom.
The aim of this study was to identify the echo morphology and stenosis of
carotid plaques that corresponded to ipsilateral asymptomatic status,
amaurosis fugax, hemispheric transient ischemic attack, and stroke. One
hundred ninety-two plaques (150 patients), producing stenosis in the range
of 50% to 99% and associated with various neurovascular manifestations,
were studied. These plaques were imaged on duplex scans, and a series of
textural features was produced in a computer to distinguish quantitatively
their various echo patterns. Amaurosis fugax corresponded to dark, severely
stenosed atheromas (90%); hemispheric transient ischemic attack and stroke
corresponded to plaques with intermediate echoic characteristics and
intermediate stenosis (80%); and asymptomatic status corresponded to
bright, moderately stenosed plaques (70%; P ] .05). The significance of
these findings is discussed.
