A Cross-Sectional Study to Evaluate Cardiovascular Risk Score in Type 2 Diabetes Mellitus

Cardiovascular disease is the leading cause of mortality worldwide, including in low- and middle-income countries. Cardiovascular risk assessment is essential to prevent the mortality caused by diabetes.

The current study was conducted to assess the prevalence of cardiovascular risk factors in type 2 diabetes and to compare the United Kingdom Prospective Diabetes Study (UKPDS) and World Health Organization (WHO)/International Society of Hypertension (ISH) chart in assessing cardiovascular risk score.

Cardiac risk assessments were done in fifty patients attending the medicine outpatient department in an institutional hospital after ethical clearance and taking informed consent from patients. Two assessment tools were applied on the same patient.

Overall, 10% of people were obese (body mass index >30). Smoking was prevalent in 20% (10/50) of patients. Hypertension was observed in 60% (30/50) of patients. Raised total cholesterol (TC) was the most common lipid abnormality affecting 94% of patients. The WHO/ISH prediction charts identified 14% and 10% of patients with cardiovascular risk category <10 and 10-20, whereas the UKPDS engine predicted 24% and 38% in the same category. In high-risk categories 30-40 and >40, the WHO/ISH score predicted a higher proportion of patients (18% and 32%) than the UKPDS engine (8% and 4%, respectively). Kappa value was calculated to calculate the degree of agreement between two tools, and it was found to be 0.781 (P < 0.01).

Raised TC and hypertension were the most prevalent risk factors. There was no significant discrepancy between two assessment tools in predicting cardiovascular risk score among type 2 diabetes mellitus patients in our study.