There are several ways your doctor may know you have narrowing or blockage in your carotid artery. Two common ones are:

• You may have had symptoms of a stroke or a transient ischemic attack (TIA, also called a mini-stroke). Some of these symptoms are weakness, blurred vision, confusion, or slurred speech.
• You may not have any symptoms, but your doctor may find a problem during a physical exam. Your doctor may hear something called a bruit when using a stethoscope to listen to your blood flow. A bruit is an abnormal sound in your artery.

Your doctor will need to do one or more tests to see how blocked one or both of your carotid arteries are.

Treatment options besides surgery that your doctor will discuss with you are:

• No treatment, other than checking your carotid artery with tests every year
• Medicine and diet to lower your cholesterol
• Tests to check your carotid artery and blood-thinning medicines to lower your risk of stroke. Some of these medicines are aspirin, clopidogrel (Plavix), and warfarin (Coumadin).

Surgery or angioplasty to remove the buildup in your carotid artery may be done if the carotid artery is narrowed by more than 70%, or if the narrowing is between 50% and 70% and your doctor feels that you have a very high risk of having a stroke.

If you have had a stroke, your doctor will consider whether treating your blocked artery with surgery is safe for you. Your doctor will compare your risk of having another stroke if you do not have surgery with the risk of having serious problems from the surgery itself.

Carotid angioplasty and stenting is more likely to be used when carotid endarterectomy would not be safe.

Your doctor will do a thorough physical exam and several medical tests.

Always tell your doctor or nurse what drugs you are taking, even drugs, supplements, or herbs you bought without a prescription.

Images

Carotid stenosis, X-ray of the right artery

Arterial plaque build-up

Atherosclerosis of internal carotid artery

Carotid stenosis, X-ray of the left artery

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Carotid artery surgery Risks

Review Date: 03/31/2011
Reviewed By: Kevin Sheth, MD, Department of Neurology, University of Maryland School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD. Review provided by VeriMed Healthcare Network. Also reviewed by David C. Dugdale, III, MD, Professor of Medicine, Division of General Medicine, Department of Medicine, University of Washington School of Medicine;David Zieve, MD, MHA, Medical Director, A.D.A.M., Inc.

A.D.A.M., Inc. is accredited by URAC, also known as the American Accreditation HealthCare Commission (www.urac.org)