Vascular surgeon-scientist Dr. Trisha Roy is connecting MRI, human tissue research and device evaluation to pursue more precise, durable treatment of peripheral artery disease.
Video Highlights
Peripheral artery disease requires a more individualized treatment strategy. Blockages may contain calcification, thrombus or fatty plaque, and these materials can respond differently to vascular interventions. Current imaging does not always distinguish among lesion types, limiting clinicians’ ability to select the most appropriate device before a procedure.
Lower-extremity vascular disease differs meaningfully from coronary disease. Leg lesions may be longer and more calcified, and medial calcinosis can affect the vessel wall independently of atherosclerosis. These characteristics may help explain why balloons and stents used successfully in coronary arteries do not produce the same results in the legs.
Dr. Roy’s translational research program uses MRI to image patients before intervention and relates plaque characteristics to lesion crossing, treatment response and changes in the vessel wall over time.
Dr. Roy's Peripheral Vascular Device Core studies donated amputated limbs by imaging and characterizing lesions, testing devices in affected vessels and examining their effects on the vessel wall. This model is intended to provide insights that animal and benchtop models may not capture in complex human disease.
Using a biorepository of more than 200 patients’ limbs and lesions, the team is linking imaging, histology and gene expression through spatial transcriptomics. The aim is to identify targets that could halt, stabilize or arrest disease progression before advanced intervention is required.
Dr. Roy also speaks about her personal life. She credits her research-focused role, with protected research time, for providing a different rhythm and flexibility than a fully clinical practice.
In this episode of Women in Surgery, Dr. Shlomit Schaal speaks with vascular surgeon and physician-scientist Dr. Trisha Roy about the long-standing challenges of treating peripheral artery disease (PAD) and what it's like to be a mother and vascular surgeon-scientist.
Dr. Roy explains that differences in lesion composition, including medial calcification, may contribute to technical failure and restenosis following lower-extremity interventions. Her translational research combines MRI, clinical follow-up and the study of donated amputated limbs to evaluate how vascular devices perform in complex human disease. The goal of this work is to support more informed device selection, more representative preclinical testing and, ultimately, precision approaches designed to address peripheral artery disease before patients develop pain, wounds or limb-threatening ischemia.
Dr. Roy also speaks about her personal life. She says she initially worried about whether being a mother, scientist and surgeon were compatible, but has since found that those roles can augment things for the better. She credits her research-focused role, with protected research time, for providing a different rhythm and flexibility than a fully clinical practice.