DSE vs. FFR in SCAD and BYSTANDER Lesions

Easy accessibility made fractional flow reserve (FFR) a widely accepted method to evaluate myocardial ischaemia in patients with moderate coronary artery stenosis, although the prognostic value for "hard" endpoints such as myocardial infarction and cardiovascular death is equivocal.

Dobutamine stress echocardiography (DSE) is a useful and safe non-invasive functional test for myocardial ichaemia evaluation. There are robust data confirming the prognostic value of DSE regarding the same "hard" endpoints.

In patients with SCAD there are clear recommendations in the recent guidelines both for DSE guided or FFR guided revascularization but the data about prognosis is limited, especially in the case of FFR guidance. The outcome is also equivocal if there is a difference between the invasive and non-invasive test result.

In patients with acute myocardial infarction, more than 50% of patients have multivessel disease. There are clear recommendations for the management of infarct related artery, however controversy still exists for the management of angiographically moderate NCLs.

In DSE vs. FFR prospective trial, the Investigators plan to perform both the DSE and FFR tests in the above mentioned clinical settings, to investigate the correlation between them. The causes of differences between them would be investigated as well as the prognostic impact of reclassification by a second test (either DSE or FFR).

If both tests are positive, revascularisation is planned to be performed (PCI Group). In cases of either double negative or mismatching tests, optimal medical therapy will be chosen (OMT Group) with clinical follow up of at least 2 years.

Inclusion criteria

• Age>18 years
• Moderate Coronary Stenosis (30-70 %)
• Stable coronary artery disease or patients with acute myocardial infarction and at least one moderate non-culprit vessel stenosis

Exclusion criteria

• Left Main Coronary artery stenosis
• Age>80 years
• Known non-cardiovascular disease with poor prognosis
• Patients for whom coronary angiography or stress echocardiography is contraindicated per institutional standard of care (e.g. History of severe and/or anaphylactic contrast reaction)
• Inability to provide informed consent;
• Inability to cooperate with the investigation
• Pregnancy