Comparing two heart imaging tests for suspected heart disease

This trial is testing whether combining two imaging tests—stress echocardiography (ultrasound) with a carotid ultrasound—works as well as or better than CT coronary angiography for detecting heart disease. Right now, doctors use one or the other, but each has limitations: CT can see small disease but struggles with severe blockages, while stress ultrasound shows severe disease but misses small areas. The trial wants to see if combining the ultrasound tests gives a more complete picture.

Heart disease kills over 160,000 people each year in the UK, and doctors need better ways to detect it early and accurately. Currently, there's no single non-invasive test that can reliably show both small and severe blockages in heart arteries, which means patients sometimes need multiple tests or may miss disease that needs treatment.