Study: The use of BMS' Cardiolite may lead to fewer cardiac caths
Bristol-Myers Squibb's (BMS) Medical Imaging division released new findings at ACC 2004 that suggest more than one-third of patients hospitalized at the initial onset of heart failure who undergo myocardial perfusion imaging (MPI) with Cardiolite may not require cardiac catheterization.

BMS says the report on Cardiolite (Kit for the Preparation of Technetium Tc99m Sestamibi for Injection) is the first multicenter study to investigate the origin and pathophysiology of heart failure, as well as the role of Cardiolite, in the initial assessment of patients hospitalized with heart failure.

Fourteen institutions studied 201 patients and found that 27 percent had significant ischemia requiring cardiac intervention, such as catheterization. Conversely, some 40 percent of patients may not require a procedure.

MPI is a nuclear cardiology procedure that, when used with an imaging agent, enables physicians to simultaneously evaluate blood flow to the heart muscle (myocardial perfusion) and heart function to assess the existence of a previous heart attack or likelihood of a future myocardial infarction.
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