[Abdominal aneurism screening in Primary Care]

To obtain the percentage of abdominal aortic aneurism (AAA) determined in men between 65-74 years old in a health centre using ultrasound, and to describe the distribution of risk factors in the whole sample and in patients with aneurism, as well as determining how many AAA are confirmed at the hospital and those cases of uncertain diagnosis.

A cross-sectional study conducted on patients included from September 2014 to February 2015. From a total of 212 randomised patients, a clinical interview and abdominal ultrasound were performed on 115 men, aged 65 to 74, telephone-recruited from a total of 171 that fulfilled inclusion criteria.

An infra-renal AAA was found in 2.6% of the sample (95% CI 0.54-7.4). Just over half (51.3%) of the sample had arterial hypertension, and 76.1% were smokers or former smokers. The 3 AAA found, one of which had an initial doubtful diagnosis, were confirmed by the Hospital Universitario Fundación Jiménez Díaz. There were no losses. All of the patients with AAA were active smokers and had at least one other risk factor.

The percentage of infra-renal AAA in the sample was lower than expected, but higher than the percentage found in other studies that did not consider smoking in the inclusion criteria.