Does submaximal treadmill electrocardiography accurately predict the morphologic state of coronary arteries in patients with undiagnosed chest pain?
Stress electrocardiography has a high false-positive rate (24%) in patients with chest pain and normal coronary arteries, limiting its value in predicting coronary morphology.
Eighty of 654 patients studied because of chest pain were found to have normal coronary arteriography. Fifty of these completed submaximal treadmill exercise studies. The purpose of this study was to determine whether treadmill electrocardiography could obviate the need for coronary arteriography in the evaluation of patients with undiagnosed chest pain. Of patients studied, 22% had typical angina pectoris, while 78% had atypical chest pain. The resting electrocardiogram was normal in 58% of patients, while 42% showed repolarization abnormalities. Submaximal treadmill testing was normal in 64%, incomplete in 12%, and demonstrated classic ischemic S-T depression in 24%. Our findings of 24% positive studies in patients with normal vessels and 12% incomplete tests suggest that stress electrocardiography may be of limited value in predicting the morphologic state of the coronary arteries in patients with undiagnosed chest pain.
Goodin et al. (Wed,) studied this question.