Women's Ischemia Syndrome Evaluation (WISE)

To evaluate innovative diagnostic methods that will improve the diagnostic reliability of cardiovascular testing in evaluation of ischemic heart disease in women. Innovative approaches proposed include physiologic or functional measurements such as impaired metabolism, perfusion, or endothelial function as well as assessment of epicardial coronary arteries by angiography. Other objectives include developing safe, accurate, and cost effective diagnostic approaches for evaluating women with suspected ischemic heart disease, and determining the frequency of myocardial ischemia in the absence of significant epicardial coronary stenosis, as well as the frequency of non-ischemic or non-cardiac chest pain. A key aspect of the WISE study is to determine whether evidence of myocardial ischemia occurs in the absence of obstructive coronary disease.