Spontaneous coronary artery dissection (SCAD) has emerged as an important cause of acute coronary syndrome, myocardial infarction, and sudden death, particularly among young women and individuals with few conventional atherosclerotic risk factors. Patient-initiated research has spurred increased awareness of SCAD, and improved diagnostic capabilities and findings from large case series have led to changes in approaches to initial and long-term management and increasing evidence that SCAD not only is more common than previously believed but also must be evaluated and treated differently from atherosclerotic myocardial infarction. High rates of recurrent SCAD; its association with female sex, pregnancy, and physical and emotional stress triggers; and concurrent systemic arteriopathies, particularly fibromuscular dysplasia, highlight the differences in clinical characteristics of SCAD compared with atherosclerotic disease. Recent insights into the causes of, clinical course of, treatment options for, outcomes of, and associated conditions of SCAD and the many persistent knowledge gaps are presented.

Background-Fibromuscular dysplasia (FMD), a noninflammatory disease of medium-size arteries, may lead to stenosis, occlusion, dissection, and/or aneurysm. There has been little progress in understanding the epidemiology, pathogenesis, and outcomes since its first description in 1938. Methods and Results-Clinical features, presenting symptoms, and vascular events are reviewed for the first 447 patients enrolled in a national FMD registry from 9 US sites. Vascular beds were imaged selectively based on clinical presentation and local practice. The majority of patients were female (91%) with a mean age at diagnosis of 51.9 (SD 13.4 years; range, 5-83 years). Hypertension, headache, and pulsatile tinnitus were the most common presenting symptoms of the disease. Self-reported family history of stroke (53.5%), aneurysm (23.5%), and sudden death (19.8%) were common, but FMD in firstor second-degree relatives was reported only in 7.3%. FMD was identified in the renal artery in 294 patients, extracranial carotid arteries in 251 patients, and vertebral arteries in 82 patients. A past or presenting history of vascular events were common: 19.2% of patients had a transient ischemic attack or stroke, 19.7% had experienced arterial dissection(s), and 17% of patients had an aneurysm(s). The most frequent indications for therapy were hypertension, aneurysm, and dissection. Conclusions-In this registry, FMD occurred primarily in middle-aged women, although it presents across the lifespan.Cerebrovascular FMD occurred as frequently as renal FMD. Although a significant proportion of FMD patients may present with a serious vascular event, many present with nonspecific symptoms and a subsequent delay in diagnosis. (Circulation. 2012;125:3182-3190.)

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This contribution is being co-published in the following journals: Journal of Hypertension and Vascular Medicine. There will be minor differences in the version published in Vascular Medicine due to copy-editing differences.

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Atherosclerotic plaque detection by carotid ultrasound provides cardiovascular disease risk stratification. The advantages and disadvantages of two-dimensional (2D) and three-dimensional (3D) ultrasound methods for carotid arterial plaque quantification are reviewed. Advanced and emerging methods of carotid arterial plaque activity and composition analysis by ultrasound are considered. Recommendations for the standardization of focused 2D and 3D carotid arterial plaque ultrasound image acquisition and measurement for the purpose of cardiovascular disease stratification are formulated. Potential clinical application towards cardiovascular risk stratification of recommended focused carotid arterial plaque quantification approaches are summarized. (J

Patients with FMD have a high prevalence of aneurysm and/or dissection prior to or at the time of FMD diagnosis. Patients with dissection were more likely to experience ischemic events, and a significant number of patients with dissection or aneurysm underwent therapeutic procedures for these vascular events. Because of the high prevalence and associated morbidity in patients with FMD who have an aneurysm and/or dissection, it is recommended that every patient with FMD undergo one-time cross-sectional imaging from head to pelvis with computed tomographic angiography or magnetic resonance angiography.

Takayasu arteritis (TA) is a rare disease affecting chiefly young women, although it can affect both men and women and persons of many different ethnicities. TA carries a high morbidity rate, but importantly, overall mortality has declined over time such that the 15-year survival rate has increased from 82.9% for patients diagnosed between 1957 and 1975 to 96.5% for those diagnosed from 1976 to 1990. Severity of presenting arterial complications and delay to diagnosis have also decreased over the past decade owing to advances in non-invasive diagnostic imaging and the development of medical therapies. Despite these advances, there still remain significant gaps in the diagnosis and management of these complex patients. These gaps encompass the basic, yet extremely complex, tasks of defining a universally accepted diagnostic criterion, accurate assessment of disease activity and development of clinically meaningful and accurate outcome measures to guide necessary clinical trials for the management of these complex patients.