Virtual coronary physiology: an angiogram is all you need? (360G-Wellcome-100122_Z_12_Z)

Disease inside the heart’s arteries kills more people in the UK than anything else. Dr Julian Gunn and his team at the University of Sheffield have developed a computer system called 'VIRTU', which predicts blood pressure changes inside coronary arteries.This is important because doctors make better decisions regarding when and how to treat patients with coronary artery disease if they have these blood pressure measurements. Currently, doctors have to insert a metal wire inside the heart to measure artery pressures. This is time-consuming and requires special equipment, staff and medicines. Although this invasive technique saves lives and money, more than 95% of patients do not receive the procedure and thus do not get the benefits that it can provide.VIRTU provides a solution to this problem since it only needs X-ray pictures and does not require any wires, drugs, or additional time, equipment or staff. This project aims to improve the speed and accuracy of VIRTU and test it in people with more complicated coronary disease so that eventually it can be used in all patients. The research will make VIRTU 'patient-ready' and will deliver all the advantages of the current invasive technique (i.e. reduced deaths, heart attacks and cost) whilst being less invasive and usable in 100% of patients.