Testing & Diagnostics
Every test below is performed and interpreted within our practice, so results arrive with context, not just numbers. Here's what each one tells us about your heart.
The Diagnostics
A quick, painless recording of your heart's electrical activity. It screens for rhythm abnormalities, evidence of prior injury, and electrical patterns that warrant a closer look: the baseline every cardiac workup starts from.
A low-dose CT scan that directly measures calcified plaque in the coronary arteries. Your calcium score is one of the strongest predictors of future heart attack risk, and a powerful way to detect disease years before symptoms.
A non-invasive ultrasound of the body's largest artery, screening for abdominal aortic aneurysm: a silent, dangerous enlargement that is highly treatable when caught early.
An ultrasound measurement of the artery walls in your neck. It detects subclinical plaque: early atherosclerosis that is already present but not yet causing symptoms. Thickening here reflects vascular aging throughout the body, letting us track atherosclerosis and stroke risk long before a blockage forms.
Undiagnosed sleep apnea drives hypertension, arrhythmia, and cardiac strain. A comfortable overnight study in your own bed tells us whether your sleep is protecting your heart, or quietly working against it.
A wearable monitor that records your heart rhythm over days to weeks of normal life, catching intermittent arrhythmias, like atrial fibrillation, that a single in-office EKG can miss.
Blood pressure measured around the clock, awake and asleep, using a discreet chest patch monitor, not a traditional cuff inflating on your arm every half hour. It unmasks white-coat readings, hidden hypertension, and abnormal nighttime patterns: the data needed to treat your real blood pressure, not your office number.
Ultrasound imaging of your heart at rest and under exercise stress. It shows how your heart muscle and valves actually perform under load: detecting flow-limiting coronary disease, uncovering valvular heart disease, and measuring your true functional capacity: what your heart can really do, not just how it looks at rest.
The ankle-brachial index compares blood pressure in your legs and arms, before and after walking, to detect peripheral arterial disease (PAD): reduced circulation to the legs that, left untreated, can progress to non-healing wounds and even amputation. PAD is also a strong marker of elevated heart attack and stroke risk: disease in the leg arteries rarely stays confined to the legs.
Led by lipoprotein(a), the inherited risk factor everyone is asking about, missed entirely by standard cholesterol tests (more on Lp(a) below). Alongside it: apolipoprotein B, particle numbers, and inflammatory markers such as hs-CRP. Together these refine your risk estimate and often change the treatment plan a basic panel would have missed.
The Test Everyone Is Asking About
Lp(a), “L-P-little-a,” has become the most talked-about number in heart health, and for good reason. It's an inherited cholesterol particle that independently raises the risk of heart attack, stroke, and aortic valve disease, and it does not show up on a standard cholesterol panel. Roughly one in five people carries an elevated level, and most have no idea.
Because Lp(a) is set almost entirely by your genes, most people only need it measured once in their life. But that single result can change how aggressively every other risk factor should be managed. We test Lp(a) in-house as part of our advanced lipid panel, and Dr. Hosmane reviews the result with you: what your number means, and what to do about it.
Ask About the Lp(a) Test →“Testing is only half the picture. The other half is a cardiologist sitting with you, explaining what every number means, and what we're going to do about it.”