Intravascular ultrasonic study of gender differences in ruptured coronary plaque morphology and its associated clinical presentation.

Coronary plaque rupture is a phenomenon underlying most acute coronary events. Although gender is an important determinant of the incidence and clinical course of coronary atherosclerosis, its relation to plaque rupture is unknown. Therefore, we assessed gender differences in native artery plaque rupture characteristics and their related clinical presentations. There were 468 intravascular ultrasound (IVUS) preintervention images of ruptured plaques retrospectively identified. There were 328 men (81.6%) with 387 plaque ruptures and 74 women (18.4%) with 81 plaque ruptures. Patient demographics, angiographic characteristics, and qualitative and quantitative IVUS analyses of ruptured plaques were assessed. On average women were older than men (67.6 +/- 11.8 vs 62.6 +/- 11.4 years, p = 0.001) and more often presented with an acute coronary syndrome (89.2% vs 72.9%, p = 0.003). Older women had smaller vessel areas at the rupture site (p = 0.001), minimum lumen site (p = 0.002), and reference segments (p = 0.002) and smaller lumen areas at the rupture site (p = 0.026) and reference segments (p = 0.03). Ruptured plaques in older women were more often associated with IVUS-evident thrombus (48.1% vs 34.6%, p = 0.022). Independent predictors of acute clinical presentation were female gender (p = 0.006), smoking (p = 0.013), and presence of thrombus (p = 0.049). Independent predictors of the presence of thrombus were female gender (p = 0.025), smaller lumen area (p = 0.023) and larger plaque area (p = 0.008) at the rupture site, longer plaque ruptures (p = 0.016), and smoking (p = 0.045). In conclusion, coronary plaque ruptures are more often associated with thrombus and acute presentations in women than in men.