Currently, calcium scoring -- measuring the amount of calcium in the arteries -- is used as a screening exam and in cases of suspected CAD, but not in cases of known CAD.

Hacker and colleagues set out to determine if calcium scoring would lend additional

prognostic value to SPECT findings in patients with known, stable CAD.

The results, based on 260 CAD patients, showed that those with initial calcium score greater than 400 were at significantly increased risk for severe cardiac events.

'We found that coronary calcium seems to play an important role in predicting subsequent heart attack or sudden cardiac death, and adds prognostic value to SPECT findings,' said co-author Christopher Uebleis, nuclear cardiologist at the LMU.

These findings were published online in Radiology.