[Guidelines for action and diagnosis in atherothrombosis in Spain: ADA Study (Action and Diagnosis in...

The ADA Study was designed to know the usual action guidelines in Spain for the diagnosis and treatment in a cohort of patients who had a recent atherothrombotic event.

Cross-sectional, observational, multicenter epidemiologic study (294 hospitals) with a total of 3,512 patients enrolled. Patients had had an atherothrombotic event in the coronary or cerebral vascular territory in the previous month or were diagnosed of symptomatic peripheral arterial disease within the last 3 months. A total of 237 investigators (155 cardiologists, 113 neurologists, and 79 vascular surgeons) participated in the study.

54.9% of patients in the study had a previous atherothrombotic event. Of these, 63.1% were on antithrombotic therapy; after the second episode, 2.6% of patients were on no preventive therapy. A great disparity and an excessive number of diagnostic tests was found to confirm the diagnosis of the current atherothrombotic event, which is in contrast with a small percentage of patients who had exams performed to confirm or rule out the atherothrombotic involvement in other vascular territories.

An appropriate protocol should be established for the diagnosis and therapy of patients with the likelihood of having clinical manifestations due to an ahterothrombotic event.