P16 Assessment of Plaque Vulnerability Using a Novel Technique: Multi-spectral Photoacoustic Imaging (CVENT-PAI)

Identification of intraplaque haemorrhage using magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) is expensive, technically demanding and sometimes uncomfortable. Photoacoustic imaging (PAI) is a new non-invasive technique combining multi-wavelength infrared laser light and ultrasound (US) imaging, able to discriminate blood and other components in the tissues. The measurement by the multi-spectral PAI is likely to be more applicable and therefore could be complementary to MRI. Validate a portable multimodal and multi-wavelength PAI system, for the identification of intraplaque haemorrhage and compare with MRI. Patients underwent carotid MRI, and US. Photoacoustic acquisitions are performed and analysed a posteriori blindly of the status of the subjects and results of MRI/US. All patients gave written informed consent. Histology of plaque will be performed as gold standard. We included 15 patients (71 ± 5 years old) with carotid stenosis grade of >70