Serial coronary computed tomography angiography-verified coronary plaque progression: comparison of stented patients with or without diabetes

BACKGROUND: Patients with Diabetes mellitus (DM) are susceptible to coronary artery disease (CAD). However, the impact of DM on plaque progression in the non-stented segments of stent-implanted patients has been rarely reported. This study aimed to evaluate the impact of DM on the prevalence, characteristics and severity of coronary computed tomography angiography (CCTA) verified plaque progression in stented patients. A comparison between diabetic and non-diabetic patients was performed. METHODS: A total of 98 patients who underwent clinically indicated serial CCTAs arranged within 1 month before and at least 6 months after percutaneous coronary intervention (PCI) were consecutively included. All the subjects were categorized into diabetic group (n = 36) and non-diabetic groups (n = 62). Coronary stenosis extent scores, segment involvement scores (SIS), segment stenosis scores (SSS) at baseline and follow-up CCTA were quantitatively assessed. The prevalence, characteristics and severity of plaque progression was evaluated blindly to the clinical data and compared between the groups. RESULTS: During the median 1.5 year follow up, a larger number of patients (72.2% vs 40.3%, P = 0.002), more non-stented vessels (55.7% vs 23.2%, P < 0.001) and non-stented segments (10.3% vs 4.4%, P < 0.001) showed plaque progression in DM group, compared to non-DM controls. More progressive lesions in DM patients were found to be non-calcified plaques (31.1% vs 12.8%, P = 0.014) or non-stenotic segments (6.6% vs 3.0%, p = 0.005) and were more widely distributed on left main artery (24.2% vs 5.2%, p = 0.007), the right coronary artery (50% vs 21.1%, P = 0.028) and the proximal left anterior artery (33.3% vs 5.1%, P = 0.009) compared to non-DM patients. In addition, DM patients possessed higher numbers of progressive segments per patient, ΔSIS and ΔSSS compared with non-DM individuals (P < 0.001, P = 0.029 and P < 0.001 respectively). A larger number of patients with at least two progressive lesions were found in the DM group (P = 0.006). Multivariate logistic regression analysis demonstrated that DM (OR: 4.81; 95% CI 1.64–14.07, P = 0.004) was independently associated with plaque progression. CONCLUSIONS: DM is closely associated with the prevalence and severity of CCTA verified CAD progression. These findings suggest that physicians should pay attention to non-stent segments and the management of non-stent segment plaque progression, particularly to DM patients.