Table 2.

Reports of screening modalities for diagnosing blunt traumatic vertebral artery injury

Author and year	Title of study	Study design	Number of patients	Territory	Outcome	Comments
Doppler ultrasonography
Mutze et al. 2005 [37]	Blunt cerebrovascular injury in patients with blunt multiple trauma: diagnostic accuracy of duplex Doppler US and early CT angiography	Retrospective case series	1,471	Carotid and Vertebral	38.5% sensitivity, 100% specificity
MR angiography
Levy et al. 1994 [36]	Carotid and vertebral artery dissections: three-dimensional time-of-flight MR angiography and MR imaging versus conventional angiography	Prospective series	5	Vertebral	20% sensitivity, 100% specificity
Biffl et al. 2002 [51]	Noninvasive diagnosis of blunt cerebrovascular injuries: a preliminary report	Prospective case series	16	Carotid and vertebral	75% sensitivity, 67% specificity
CT angiography
Biffl et al. 2002 [51]	Noninvasive diagnosis of blunt cerebrovascular injuries: a preliminary report	Prospective case series	46	Carotid and vertebral	68% sensitivity, 67% specificity
Mutze et al. 2005 [37]	Blunt cerebrovascular injury in patients with blunt multiple trauma: diagnostic accuracy of duplex Doppler US and early CT angiography	Retrospective case series	407	Carotid and vertebral	100% sensitivity, 99.7% specificity
Eastman et al. 2006 [7]	Vertebral artery injury after acute cervical spine trauma: rate of occurrence as detected by MR angiography and assessment of clinical consequences	Prospective case series	146	Carotid and vertebral	97.7% sensitivity, 100% specificity
Utter et al. 2006 [49]	Sixteen-slice CT angiography in patients with suspected blunt carotid and vertebral artery injuries	Retrospective case series	82	Carotid and vertebral	92% negative predictive value	CTA negative, suspected vessel injury patients.