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Review
. 2015 Mar 30;46(1):41-6.
eCollection 2015 Jan-Mar.

Identification of coronary heart disease in asymptomatic individuals with diabetes mellitus: to screen or not to screen

Paco E Bravo  1 , Bruce M Psaty  2 , Marcelo F Di Carli  3 , Kelley R Branch  1
Affiliations
Review

Identification of coronary heart disease in asymptomatic individuals with diabetes mellitus: to screen or not to screen

Paco E Bravo et al. Colomb Med (Cali). .

Abstract
in English, Spanish

Coronary heart disease (CHD) is highly prevalent in patients with diabetes mellitus (DM), and remains the single most common cause of death among this population. Regrettably, a significant percentage of diabetics fail to perceive the classic symptoms associated with myocardial ischemia. Among asymptomatic diabetics, the prevalence of abnormal cardiac testing appears to be high, ranging between 10% and 62%, and mortality is significantly higher in those with abnormal scans. Hence, the potential use of screening for CHD detection among asymptomatic DM individuals is appealing and has been recommended in certain circumstances. However, it was not until recently, that this question was addressed in clinical trials. Two studies randomized a total of 2,023 asymptomatic diabetics to screening or not using cardiac imaging with a mean follow up of 4.4 ± 1.4 years. In combination, both trials showed lower than expected annual event rates, and failed to reduce major cardiovascular events in the screened group compared to the standard of care alone. The results of these trials do not currently support the use of screening tools for CHD detection in asymptomatic DM individuals. However, these studies have important limitations, and potential explanations for their negative results that are discussed in this manuscript.

La enfermedad de la arterias coronarias (EAC) es muy prevalente en pacientes con diabetes mellitus (DM), y continúa siendo la principal causa de muerte en estos pacientes. Desafortunadamente, muchos diabéticos pueden carecer de síntomas de alerta en la presencia de isquemia miocárdica, por lo cual el diagnóstico de EAC puede ocurrir de manera tardía. Estudios observacionales han sugerido que la prevalencia de isquemia miocárdica puede ser alta en diabéticos asintomáticos (10 al 62% según la serie) y la mortalidad es mayor en esos pacientes. Por esto, el uso de pruebas para detección de EAC en el paciente diabético asintomático parece atractivo y es recomendado en ciertas circunstancias. Sin embargo, no fue si no hasta hace poco que dos estudios investigaron el verdadero rol de estas pruebas de manera aleatoria. En conjunto, 2,023 pacientes diabéticos asintomáticos fueron aleatorizados a recibir o no una prueba para detección de EAC y fueron seguidos en promedio por 4.4 ± 1.4 años. Al final de seguimiento, ambos estudios mostraron menos eventos cardiovasculares de los esperados, y el uso de pruebas para detección de EAC no redujo la tasa de eventos cardiovasculares comparado al no uso de estas pruebas. Los resultados de estos ensayos clínicos no soportan actualmente el uso de estas pruebas en el paciente diabético asintomático. Sin embargo, estos estudios tienen limitaciones importantes, y posibles hipótesis para explicar los resultados que son discutidas en el artículo.

Keywords: Screening; coronary heart disease; diabetes.

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Conflict of interest statement

Conflicts of interest: Dr. Psaty serves on the DSMB for a clinical trial of a device funded by the manufacturer (Zoll LifeCor) and on the steering committee of the Yale Open Data Access Project funded by Johnson & Johnson

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