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Updated: Mar 16, 2026
Identifying Coronary Artery Calcification on Non-gated Computed Tomography Scans
Published on: August 28, 2018
Gender and age effects on risk factor-based prediction of coronary artery calcium in symptomatic patients: A
R Nicoll1, U Wiklund2, Y Zhao3
1Department of Public Health and Clinical Medicine, Umeå University and Heart Centre, Umeå, Sweden.
Insights
Gender and age significantly impact coronary artery calcification (CAC) prediction in symptomatic patients. Risk factor importance varies by sex and age group, especially over 70.
Area of Science:
- Cardiology
- Medical Imaging
- Epidemiology
Background:
- The predictive value of traditional risk factors for coronary artery calcification (CAC) varies with gender and age.
- Understanding these differences is crucial for accurate risk assessment in symptomatic individuals.
Purpose of the Study:
- To investigate the influence of gender and age on the prediction of coronary artery calcification (CAC) using conventional risk factors in symptomatic patients.
Main Methods:
- Retrospective analysis of 6309 symptomatic patients from the EURO-CCAD cohort.
- Risk factor assessment and computed tomography (CT) scanning for CAC scoring were performed.
Main Results:
- CAC prevalence was lower in females across all age groups.
- Age, dyslipidemia, hypertension, diabetes, and smoking were independent predictors of CAC.
- Predictive factor importance differed by gender and age, particularly in individuals over 70.
Conclusions:
- Significant gender and age-related differences exist in the predictive ability of risk factors for CAC in symptomatic patients.
- Age plays a critical role in modifying the predictive power of conventional risk factors for CAC.
Background And Aims:
The influence of gender and age on risk factor prediction of coronary artery calcification (CAC) in symptomatic patients is unclear.
Methods:
From the European Calcific Coronary Artery Disease (EURO-CCAD) cohort, we retrospectively investigated 6309 symptomatic patients, 62% male, from Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Spain and USA. All of them underwent risk factor assessment and CT scanning for CAC scoring.
Results:
The prevalence of CAC among females was lower than among males in all age groups. Using multivariate logistic regression, age, dyslipidaemia, hypertension, diabetes and smoking were independently predictive of CAC presence in both genders. In addition to a progressive increase in CAC with age, the most important predictors of CAC presence were dyslipidaemia and diabetes (β = 0.64 and 0.63, respectively) in males and diabetes (β = 1.08) followed by smoking (β = 0.68) in females; these same risk factors were also important in predicting increasing CAC scores. There was no difference in the predictive ability of diabetes, hypertension and dyslipidaemia in either gender for CAC presence in patients aged <50 and 50-70 years. However, in patients aged >70, only dyslipidaemia predicted CAC presence in males and only smoking and diabetes were predictive in females.
Conclusions:
In symptomatic patients, there are significant differences in the ability of conventional risk factors to predict CAC presence between genders and between patients aged <70 and ≥70, indicating the important role of age in predicting CAC presence.
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