An Autopsy Study on Coronary Atherosclerosis with Morphological and Morphometric Analysis

Objectives: Atherosclerosis is the pathology that underlies Coronary artery disease which can be best studied on autopsy. The study aims to evaluate coronary atherosclerosis by means of morphological and morphometric analysis. Study also intends to assess the correlation between morphometric parameters and morphological grades of coronary atherosclerotic lesions. Methodology: Study was carried out on 150 autopsy cases of both sexes in the 30-60 years age group. Representative bit of each coronary artery was taken and processed conventionally. Morphological assessment of atherosclerosis was done according to AHA (American Heart Association) criteria while two morphometric parameters namely percentage of luminal narrowing and intima-to-media ratio (IMR) were used to evaluate degree of atherosclerosis. Results: Study included 114 males and 36 females. Coronary atherosclerosis was present in 122 cases (81.3%). Values of both morphometric parameters showed a linear increase with each higher grade of atherosclerosis in all three coronaries. Conclusion: The study results indicate that the morphometric parameters correlate with the morphological grades of atherosclerosis in all three coronaries. Hence these parameters can serve as reliable indices for assessing the severity of atherosclerotic lesions supplementing the histomorphological analysis.