Table 1

Characteristics of the patient population

	Stable group	Unstable group	p Value
Total number of patients	37	32
Male/female	24/13	26/6	0.129
Age (years) (mean (SD))	60 (10)	59 (10)	0.578
Angina class (CCS)
Class II	10	9
Class III	27	6
Class IV	0	17
Postinfarct angina	0	15
Vessel disease
Single/double/triple	20/15/2	28/4/0	0.009
Culprit lesion artery
RCA/LAD/Cx	14/16/7	18/13/1	0.083
Hypercholesterolaemia^1-150	26/35	17/31	0.098
Family history^1-151	18/30	20/29	0.472
Smoking	16/33	19/27	0.087
Diabetes mellitus	2/37	3/32	0.526
Hypertension	12/34	6/30	0.174
Drug treatment before ICUS
Aspirin	36/37	32/32	1.000
β Blocker	31/37	27/32	0.947
Calcium antagonist	17/37	15/32	0.938
Heparin (sc, iv)	0/37	6/32	0.008
Glyceryl trinitrate (iv)	0/37	4/32	0.042
Nitrates (oral)	28/37	20/32	0.298
Statins	21/37	13/32	0.230
ACE inhibitors	9/37	3/32	0.123

Values are numbers of patients unless otherwise stated. In some cases the data were unavailable.
↵1-150 Hypercholesterolaemia: total cholesterol > 5.4 mmol/l;
↵1-151 family history: family history of coronary artery disease before 60 years of age.
ACE, angiotensin converting enzyme; CCS, Canadian Cardiovascular Society; Cx, circumflex coronary artery; ICUS, intracoronary ultrasound; iv, intravenous; LAD, left anterior descending coronary artery; RCA, right coronary artery; sc, subcutaneous.