To Estimate or Not to Estimate Cardiovascular Risk? That is the Question

Abstract

In 1961, Dr. William Kannel1 published the first article on CRF from data of the Framingham cohort, Massachusetts. The collection began in 1948, when the cardiovascular mortality rates in the United States were higher compared with the current mortality rates in Brazil and Europe. The first generation of the cohort included about 14,500 men and women in the fifth decade of life; the second one included children from the initial selection, recruited in 1971, and the third one included 4,095 individuals, started in 2002. An equation was designed using multivariate analysis with age, sex, smoking, systolic blood pressure, total cholesterol and HDL cholesterol to estimate the risk of developing coronary artery disease in 10 years. Composite outcome was angina, cerebrovascular events, peripheral vascular disease and heart failure. Some models, not yet validated, estimated CRF in 30 years or throughout life2.