What problems can angiography find? i have heart disease and my doctor wants to do angiography. but i dont understand what hes looking for? we already know about the heart disease. what else could he find?

An : An angiogram is a way to take pictures of blood vessels, in this case your coronary arteries. There are two main reasons for doing this even when you have "heart disease." one is that there are times that the methods used to diagnose heart disease, particularly stress testing, can be wrong or inaccurate, and an angiogram will tell you exactly what is going on inside the heart so that your treatment can be adjusted to reflect your level of diseae. Think of it like a confirmatory test so that you don't end up treated with unneeded medications. The other is that during an angiogram there is often the opportunity to open up blockages with a balloon (angioplasty) and possibly leave a stent behind to keep the vessel open.

Severity blockages: Angiography is used to identify and assess the severity of coronary artery blockages. Severe blockages may benefit from bypass or stents, while milder blockages are usually treated with medication.

PossibleOtherOptions: Angiograms only show an x-ray shadow-gram, still or motion, of dye/blood inside blood vessels; but keeping them open so blood can get where needed important. (also keep in mind: artery ds is in artery walls & does not show in angiogram images plus only larger openings visible). After ds is advanced, plaque ruptures lead to clots (locally & downstream); angioplasty & surgery can partially ↓symptoms.