Prognostic implications of surrogate markers of atherosclerosis in low to intermediate risk patients with Type 2 Diabetes (original) (raw)

Background Type 2 diabetes mellitus (T2DM) patients are at increased risk of developing cardiovascular events. Unfortunately traditional risk assessment scores, including the Framingham Risk Score (FRS), have only modest accuracy in cardiovascular risk prediction in these patients. Methods We sought to determine the prognostic values of different non-invasive markers of atherosclerosis, including brachial artery endothelial function, carotid artery atheroma burden, ankle-brachial index, arterial stiffness and computed tomography coronary artery calcium score (CACS) in 151 T2DM Chinese patients that were identified low-intermediate risk from the FRS recalibrated for Chinese (<20% risk in 10 years). Patients were prospectively followed-up and presence of atherosclerotic events documented for a mean duration of 61 ± 16 months. Results A total of 17 atherosclerotic events in 16 patients (11%) occurred during the follow-up period. The mean FRS of the study population was 5.0 ± 4.6% an...