Atherosclerosis imaging in drug development

Increasing use of established medical therapies presents a major challenge for the assessment of experimental antiatherosclerotic agents. The requirement to perform clinical trials with increasing numbers of subjects, followed for longer periods of time, creates a scenario that is largely prohibitive for the development of most new agents. Technologic advances in arterial wall imaging provide the opportunity to evaluate the impact of therapies on the natural history of atherosclerosis. The design and implementation of clinical trials that employ serial imaging of the arterial wall has become increasingly used in the development of new therapies to target atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease.