Public release date: 3-Jul-2007

HOUSTON—(July 3, 2007)—Current PET-CT scanners with standard commercial software designed to provide images of the heart are falsely indicating coronary artery disease in as many as 40 percent of patients, according to a study published today on the cover page of the Journal of Nuclear Medicine.

The technology showed false-positive results in 40 percent of the 259 patients who participated in Gould’s study. In 23 percent of those patients, it showed severe false abnormalities suggesting heart disease, which Gould said could have resulted in unwarranted, emergency heart procedures if he had not run additional tests to confirm his suspicions of the inaccurate results.

PET-CT is a valuable tool in the detection and management of coronary artery disease, Gould said, and he hopes other cardiologists and their patients will insist that scanner manufacturers resolve problems with the software to produce the most accurate results.